INDIANORIGIN ENTREPRENEUR TO CONTEST IN SENATE RACE

VA Shiva Ayyadurai, an Indian American who says he is the inventor of email, is looking to unseat firebrand Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren in Massachusetts, with supporters calling next year’s election a battle between a “real Indian” and a “fake Indian”.

Warren had claimed, without evidence and to much derision, in her 2012 campaign for the senate she was part Cherokee, an American Indian tribe. She won that election, but has not been able to shake off the controversy about her heritage since.

Ayyadurai, a Republican, has slammed Warren on Twitter with the hashtags #Fakeindian and #Realindian, with supporters calling him the “real Indian” who will unseat the “fake Indian”.

He launched his campaign in February on Shivratri, tweeting, “Today, Shivaratri, when Light overcame Darkness, we launched my campaign for US SENATE against @Senwarren. Defend the American Dream!”

Ayyadurai, 53, came to the US from Mumbai with his family in 1970. “On my 7th birthday, in 1970, I left India and came to America: to this land of incredible opportunity,” he said on his campaign website.

While in high school in New Jersey, Ayyadurai, who was 14 then, says he developed an “electronic version of the old-fashioned interoffice paper mail system (inbox, outbox, folders, memo attachments etc)” and named it Email. In 1982, he received a US copyright for “Email”.

Ayyadurai studied at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and earned four separate degrees at the prestigious institution. He is now is now chairman and CEO of Cytosolve Inc, which says it has “developed the world’s first computational platform for scalable integration of molecular pathway models”. Arriving in India at the beginning of my six-day visit, I was yet again struck by the many similarities between our two nations.

Malaysia and India have deep historical ties going back centuries. We have always been trading nations; outward-looking and keen to forge friendships with our neighbours and partners in the region.

This year marks the 60th anniversary of formal diplomatic relations. Malaysia’s father of independence, Tunku Abdul Rahman, visited India in 1962 as our first Prime Minister. Before that, while both India and Malaysia were under colonial rule, there was a visit to what was then Malaya by Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first Prime Minister, in 1937.

In the years since, both countries have shown their commitment to regional and multilateral fora, through membership of the UN, the Non-aligned Movement, the Commonwealth, the G15 and the G77 plus China, the Indian Ocean Rim Association – which had its first ever leaders’ summit injakartarecently andtheeast ciation of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), we also enjoy a free trade area with India.

Since 1998, India has been Malaysia’s largest export destination in the South Asian region, and over the last decade or so, trade has increased by more than four-fold. India is currently Malaysia’s 10th largest trading partner, our seventh largest export destination, and our 12th largest source of imports.

India is also currently Malaysia’s 20th largest investor, with total investment worth $2.31 billion Malaysia is ranked as the India globally, and the second largest from ASEAN.

But our relationship is not just about trade and economics. It’s one that is deeply personal.

I myself have been to India on a number of occasions: having undertaken an official visit in January 2010, and visiting again in December 2012 to attend the ASEAN-INDIA Special Commemorative Summit in New Delhi. We have also welcomed Prime Minister Narendra Modi to Malaysia in November 2015, when we elevated bilateral relations to an Enhanced Strategic Partnership inaugurated the Torana Gate – a gift from India to Malaysia that serves as a vibrant symbol of our friendship, while also providing a new landmark in our capital Kuala Lumpur – for tourists and locals to marvel at its intricate carvings and stunning design.

The site chosen for the Torana Gate is in an area known as “Little India”. It has a special resonance in Malaysia, for our relationship is almost like family. So it is appropriate that our bond is growing across a broad spectrum of sectors, including trade, education health defence security