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South Asians assertive diaspora in U.S.

Special Correspondent

It is largely due to backlash the community faced in post 9/11 America

Sea change in the community
They show great interest in elections

CHENNAI: The South Asian diaspora is beginning to assert itself in United States politics, as the rise in voter turnout, the number of political candidates and the financial contributions from the community attest.

“It feels like there is a sea change in the community with individuals becoming very interested in what is going to happen in the 2008 elections and mobilising themselves to get engaged,” Deepa Iyer, Executive Director, South Asian Americans Leading Together (SAALT), said over videophone from Washington DC at a conference organised by the American Consulate and the Asian College of Journalism on Tuesday.

The transformation of a politically apathetic community into a politically active one is largely due to the backlash that the community has faced in post 9/11 America, she said.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation received a 1,400 per cent increase from individuals claiming a post 9/11 backlash in 2002.

And while those numbers have now fallen, she said, the anti-immigration sentiment the U.S. is experiencing is bringing South Asians out to the ballot box – in a poll taken in 5 eastern States, 42 per cent of South Asians who voted in 2004 were first-time voters.

Debates at the national level in Congress over immigration reform have brought local concerns about delays in visas, naturalisation and green cards to the fore, she said.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security found that at 280,000, Indians are the fastest growing set of non-documented immigrants into the country.

But not all of them default on their status deliberately, she said. Victims of domestic abuse or trafficking, such as the guest workers who on Tuesday began their march from Louisiana to Washington DC to protest against ill-treatment, should be better served by a more equitable system, she said.

Among top donors

South Asians have organised themselves into groups around all three major candidates, whether for Democratic candidates Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton or Republican nominee John McCain. They are among the top donors of over $50,000 to the two democratic campaigns and voter registration in the community is on the rise.

And while Bobby Jindal captured the headlines when he won the post of governor in Louisiana, several other South Asians serve in State legislatures in Maryland, Ohio, Iowa and New Jersey.

Among other issues, concerns about outsourcing have arisen, which all candidates have sought to address.

Ms. Iyer said that these were being exaggerated at a time of economic downturn and that SAALT was working to ensure that this was not used to drive a wedge between communities of different race or colour.

Increased participation is unlikely to result in any major changes in formal diplomatic relations between the two countries because of the prominence given to domestic issues in the campaign and the voting process, Dr V.K. Padmanabhan of the Centre for South East Asian Studies, University of Madras, observed. But he noted on an individual level many South Asian Americans were working to bring their home and their host country together. This, he said, could help dissipate conflict in south Asia and lead to better relations between SAARC countries.

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