More than three dozen Indian Americans are running for local bodies and state legislative elections across the country, reflecting the growing interest among this small ethnic community to become part of the political mainstream.
“If you’re not at the table, you’re on the menu,” remarks Indian American Congressman Raja Krishnamurthy at various Indian American gatherings, inspiring and encouraging community members to contest elections at all levels.
Probably the largest number of Indian Americans running for local offices is in the state of California, which sends two members to the House of Representatives – Ro Khanna and Dr. Ami Bera, whose mother was from India, in addition to Vice President Kamala Harris.
These include Adalah Chishti who is running for County Supervisor for District 11, Aliya Chishti for City College Board San Francisco, Darshana Patel for State Assembly, Nicole Fernandez for San Mateo City Council, Nithya Raman for Los Angeles City Council For, Richa Awasthi is running for Foster City. Council and Sukhdeep Kaur for Emeryville City Council.
Tara Srikrishnan is seeking to run for California State Assembly from District 26 in Silicon Valley.
With approximately 900,000 Indian Americans, California boasts the largest Indian American population in the entire country. Michigan is a presidential battleground, where the election is decided by just 10,000 votes.
Dr. Ajay Raman, running for Oakland County Commissioner for District 14; While Anil Kumar and Ranjeev Puri are running for Michigan State House.
Indian Americans are an important part of Arizona’s development and diversity. Priya Sundaresan is running for state senate in Arizona and Ravi Shah is running for school board. In Pennsylvania, Anand Patek, Anna Thomas and Arvind Venkat are running for the state House, while Nikil Saval is looking to enter the state Senate.
In Illinois, Anusha Thotakura is running for school board and Nabeel Syed is running for state House.
If elected, Ashwin Ramaswamy will be the youngest person elected to the Georgia State Senate. Recently he has been the victim of racial and hateful attacks by his opponents.
In Ohio, Chantal Raghu is running for County Commissioner and Pawan Parikh is running for County Clerk of Courts, while in Virginia, Danny Avula is running for Mayor of Richmond.
In New York, Jeremy Cooney and Manita Shanghvi are running for state Senate, while Zoharan Mamdani is seeking to enter the state Assembly.
Indian Americans running for local offices in Texas include Aashika Ganguly for City Council, Kartik Sura (State Senate), Nabil Shike (County Constable), Ramesh Premkumar (City Council), Ravi Sandil (Judge), Salman Bhojani (State House ), Shekhar is included. Sinha (State House), Sherin Thomas (Judge), Suleman Lalani (State House) and Sumbel Zeb have been appointed as County Assessment Courts.
Manka Dhingra is running for Attorney General of Washington State while Mona Das is running for Commissioner of Public Lands. PTI LKJ GSP GSP
(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
