My first month in the US, while chomping a cheeseburger and bemoaning how much I missed the beef rolls of Park Circus when a Hindu-American classmate said "How can you even call yourself an Indian?" He'd been to India thrice, spoke no desi languages, but knew what real India is.
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This classmate was a reliable Democrat. He was always ready to point out the systemic racism and exclusion he faced in the US- and he wasn't wrong. But he saw no contradiction between that and his Islamophobic view of what India should be. It's this attitude I find appalling.
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The BJP thrives on diasporic money and resources, including electoral machinery now. After Nehru turned Indian foreign policy away from the diaspora, to not complicate relations with Non-Aligned Movement countries, the diaspora's desire for belonging was filled by Hindu orgs.
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I remember as a child in 1990s Holland listening to old Bollywood songs on a radio station run by the Indo-Surinami. It was full of Hindutva messaging. No wonder when bricks were sent for Ramjanmabhoomi in the 80s, they arrived from Holland and Surinam as well.
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The BJP comes out of these Hindu organizations that long maintained diasporic connections. Modi's speech at Madison Square Gardens was a signal moment for them- the state itself now embraced them. No other Indian party has access to the diaspora's resources or uses it so well.
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It's one of the reasons the BJP looked like a modern western data-driven campaign and everybody else was fighting with tactics that were thirty years behind. It was never a real contest- you can't fight data-driven elections with old tactics, especially given the wealth gap.
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If we are going to defeat the BJP, we have to understand the diaspora. Leaving aside Hindus for Trump, there are potential allies among liberals at home who can be forced to confront their illiberalism abroad. It's this group that is excited for Tulsi Gabbard. They can be reached
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Dismissing the diaspora's affective need for belonging or the struggles they face in the receiving country as minorities only hurts our cause here in India. There are diasporic solidarities to be built on the left and it may be the most important opportunity Indians are missing.
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In my teaching I always try to include diasporic history as part of my South Asia courses. Not only does it help my diasporic students connect to South Asian history, but it gives them a historical sense of where unexamined attitudes towards South Asia in the diaspora come from.
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By the same token, it helps South Asian students understand their diasporic peers and to not react (as I confess I did as a teen in my first months in the US) with outrage that South Asian Americans might have strong feelings about South Asia, despite not knowing it.
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Nationalism blinkers us on all sides. Historicizing it helps us see more clearly and to begin to clear ground for useful solidarities.
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My greatest inspiration are my students. I remember one semester when a diasporic girl who had remained very quiet throughout the course came alive during the diaspora week. Her longest outburst was in the final week when we read the HRW report on the Gujarat riots.
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She'd initially hated the course- it challenged too much of what she thought she knew about India. But studying the pre-history of Modi at Madison Square Gardens and his actions in Gujarat changed her. She called her mother to ask how could they support the BJP.
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Not only did it confirm to me the transformational power of historical pedagogy but also the importance of thinking with the diaspora and its history not just academically but politically. Much of what happens in India is decided elsewhere. We need to realize that.
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