Indian-Americans: From individual success to collective significance
■ The ‘Howdy, Modi’ event in Houston brought the Indian-American community together from all over the United States under the auspices of the ‘Texas-India Forum’. The forum was created as a non-profit body with the objective to ‘encourage cooperation between the US and India’.
The spectacular “Howdy, Modi” event in Houston on September 22 marked a milestone in the journey of the Indian-American community from individual achievements to recognition as a collective significant on the US political firmament. The presence of a large number of US Congressmen, Senators and high elected officials in the Narendra Modi rally at Madison Square Garden in 2014 was repeated and capped by the presence of the President of the United States at the NRG Stadium in Houston.
The total population of Americans with Indian roots, including from East Africa and the Caribbean, is about 4.4 million, which is 1.3 per cent of the US population. The Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 had opened entry to the US of immigrants from countries other than Europe. From 1965 until the information technology boom of the mid-1990s, long-term immigration from India averaged about 40,000 per year with many doctors, nurses, management graduates and hoteliers. Since the beginning of this century, there has been a huge increase in the migration of ICT professionals and engineers. Indian-Americans have focused on higher education and are highly successful, with an average household income of more than $100,000 as compared to the median US household income of about $55,000. According to PEW Research in 2015, 32 per cent of adult Indian-Americans have a graduate degree and 40 per cent are post-graduates; far above
the average of 19 per cent Americans as graduates and 11 per cent post-graduates.
The event in Houston brought the Indian-American community together from all over the United States under the auspices of the “Texas-India Forum”. The forum was created as a non-profit body with the objective to “encourage cooperation between the US and India, advancing the shared values of democracy, inclusive economic development, and mutual respect”. More than 600 community and business organisations, hundreds of volunteers, the Indian Consulate in Houston, city officials and the office of the governor of Texas worked tirelessly for weeks to make the event a success in programming, participation and arrangements. The overall control was with the “Overseas Friends of BJP” but the event saw the enthusiastic participation of Indian-Americans covering the entire spectrum of community activities from the Indo-US Chambers of
Commerce to bodies representing different religions, faiths, sects, states and corporates.
On September 22, Houston was strewn with welcome messages and personalised billboards showing special videos from various entities. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s message read, “I’m deeply appreciative of PM Modi’s commitment to Digital India — India needs to be a leader online”. Messages from different sections of the society included from Satya Nadella of Microsoft, Durga Agrawal of Piping Tech and David Leeborn, president of the prestigious Rice University.
The three-hour program was designed to offer a glimpse of the rich contributions of Indian-Americans to the cultural, intellectual and social landscape of the United States with the theme “Shared Dreams: Bright Futures”. The presence of President Donald Trump for the entire event was the surprise icing on the cake. India’s ambassador to the US Harsh Vardhan Shringla rightly observed that the joint appearance by the two leaders was “unconventional and unique”. The presence of a large number of elected officials also reflected the strong bipartisan support for close India-US relations.
For Team Trump, every vote in the 2020 presidential election is important. In the close 2016 contest, Hillary Clinton had nearly three million more votes than Mr Trump. Also, Mr Trump was ahead in three swing states by less than 100,000 votes. It is estimated that in 2016, candidate Trump could garner only 16 per cent of the Indian-American vote. Most Indian-Americans are from middle class origins with traditional family and social values and were repelled by the boorish antics of the maverick Republican candidate. Hillary Clinton, on the other hand, was a more predictable personality and 84 per cent of the community vote went in her favour.
The mass adulation at the stadium reinforced the perception that Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s personality and charisma continue to charm the Indian diaspora. The diaspora, particularly in the US, is markedly nationalist, aspirational and achievement-oriented. In these sentiments, the community identifies with the strong messaging by an eloquent Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
The Houston rally is a declaration that the Indian-American community is now organisationally mature and politically significant. Americans of Indian origin are making their presence felt in US public life and are going for elected posts at the city, state and national levels. As Ashok Mago, a Pravasi Bhartiya and Padma Shree awardee, asserts, the Indian-American community must make determined efforts to integrate better with American public and political space. The achievements have already been notable. Indian-Americans donate substantially to the electoral campaigns of candidates of both major parties.
In 2007 Bobby Jindal was elected the governor of Louisiana and in 2010 Nikki Haley became the governor of South Carolina. In the 2016 election, Pramila Jayapal, Ro Khanna and Raja Krishnamurthy were elected to the US House of Representatives and Kamala Harris to the Senate. The US corporate world has thrown up a large number of Indian origin CEOs from Indra Nooyi of Pepsico and Viktor Menezes of Citigroup to Satya Nadella of Microsoft and Sundar Pichai of Google. The young generation is also making its mark. Seven out of the eight winners of the National Spelling Bee contest in 2019 were of Indian origin!
The “Howdy, Modi” spectacle was a resounding reflection of the “Achche Din” of the Indian-American community in the United States.