You Are Welcome Mr. Prime Minister
Our expanding cooperation in areas of social and human development, science and technology, energy, and other related areas will improve the quality of lives of millions of people in our country. The success of the nearly 2.7 million strong American community is a tribute to our common ethos. They have enriched and deepened our ties, and I thank them profoundly from the core of my heart.
The above statement thanking the Indian community in the United States was part of the toast remarks made by the Prime Minister of India Manmohan Singh at the State Dinner organized by President Barak Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama. I like many Indians in America was extremely proud and happy to see Manmohan Singh in Washington DC. By all accounts the Obama administration rolled out the red carpet for this visit. Manmohan Singh clearly made India proud by his actions and speeches during his brief visit to the United States.
I have lived in America for a very long time. I consider myself as an Indian American (officially the US Census Bureau uses the term “Asian Indian” for people like me who are of Indian ancestry. This is to avoid confusion with the term “American Indian” which is the term used for Native Americans). It is estimated that there are anywhere between 2.5 to 3 million people of Indian origin who live in the United States. The median age is about 30 and the median household income is about $70,000 making them one of the wealthiest ethnic groups in the United States.
Indians from all parts of the world have lived in North America long before the United States came in to being as a country. The East India Company brought Indians as “indentured servants” to the United States and many of the Caribbean islands in the 16th century. This trend continued even after America got its independence from the British. However, the first significant immigration from India occurred between 1899 and 1914 when Sikhs from Punjab started arriving in Angel Island (California).
One of the unfortunate facts is that the United States for a long time had immigration laws that specifically prevented Indians from entering the country and also from becoming citizens of the country. Akhoy Kumar Mozumdar (a lecturer and writer) is generally considered to be the first Indian to become an American citizen in 1913 (he convinced the judge that he was white since according to the then American law only white people were allowed to become American citizens).
But his citizenship was revoked in 1923 because the US Supreme Court decided that no person from India (East Indian) could become a naturalized American citizen. This Supreme Court decision was based on the Immigration Act of 1917 (this act added Asians to the list of people banned from entering the country. This list also included idiots, feeble-minded persons, criminals, epileptics, insane persons, alcoholics, beggars, mentally or physically defective individuals and illiterate people!!). All Indians should be thankful to President Harry Truman who in 1946 (a year before India gained its independence from Britain) signed into law the Luce-Celler Act. This law specifically gives Indians and people from Philippines (which was an American colony) naturalization rights (in reality this law was largely symbolic since only 100 people from India and Philippines were allowed to become American citizens in a year).
It is important for immigrants like me to read and understand the story of Indians who immigrated to the United States in the years past. It was an extremely tough journey and the choices they had were not good. Most of these Indian immigrants were either slaves or forced laborers who were trying to escape from the crutches of the Europeans only to land in America which in turn was treating them as third rate human beings. The “land of the free home of the brave” motto for the most part only applied to human beings who were “white”.
Unfortunately race based immigration still exists in America (Japan is the only country outside of Western Europe and Australia that is included in the Visa Waiver Program (VWP)). Only 7% of the available Green Cards (you have to have one before you become a citizen except in rare circumstances) are assigned to a specific country. This would mean that a country like Belgium can send the same number of immigrants to the United States every year as China or India. On the outside this looks fair but the reality is very few people from the developed nations want to immigrate to the United States. Most of the immigrants are from poor and developing nations. People from these countries have to wait for more than a decade to become an American citizen (it took me 15 years).
Most Indian Americas are very glad to see the relationship between America and India change for the better. This is a relationship that has a lot of potential. Unlike India’s relationship with the former Soviet Union or China, the India-America relationship is much more than a government to government relationship. It is definitely a people to people relationship and will improve irrespective of the party in power in New Delhi or in Washington DC. The State Dinner yesterday was attended by many prominent politicians and members of the business community from both the Republican and Democratic parties. I am also encouraged by the fact that the Congress Party is continuing the policies started by the BJP in the mid 1990’s to deepen and broaden the scope of the relationship between the two countries.
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Category: News & Government