Bobby Jindal: A step forward for South Asian Americans?
By Divanee Staff

By now, everyone has heard of Bobby Jindal. Although he narrowly lost his daring bid for governor of Louisiana last fall, he rose to the top of the news for Indian-Americans and Americans in general. The recognition of Jindal is well-deserved, since he has risen to fame through almost unbelievable talent. At the delicate age of just 32, he has been a Rhodes scholar; a consultant to corporate CEOs and management for McKinsey; the head of Louisiana's Department of Health and Hospitals; the executive director of the Breaux-Thomas commission on Medicare reform; the President of the University of Louisiana system; and an assistant secretary of the federal Department of Health and Human Service.

Jindal is widely credited for converting Louisiana’s Medicaid deficit into a surplus while he ran the state health department. If Jindal is not the most famous and influential Indian-American, he soon will be: he announced in February that he will be running Congress in the First Congressional District seat being vacated by Rep. David Vitter in Louisiana. In the gubernatorial election in this particular district, which is traditionally staunchly Republican, Jindal received two-thirds of the vote over his opponent, Kathleen Blanco. Initial polls put him far ahead of his expected opponents. It’s frankly hard to see at this point how he can fail in his bid.

Since Jindal’s bid for governor brought him fame, much has been of the fact that he is advancing the cause for Indian (and generally South Asian) Americans. Indian-Americans rallied around Jindal in the leadup to the November gubernatorial election, lending moral and financial support to his campaign (it is said that roughly a third of his funds, which in total surpassed any other candidates, came from Indian-Americans).

But the hype over Bobby Jindal didn’t stop in the United States. Indeed, back in India too he captured the media’s attention and much was made of the US-born Jindal as an example of a resurgent India, a flourishing diaspora, and indeed someone who has “put India firmly on the global map.” (Sunday Times of India, October 23, 2003). (Indeed, the idea that one billion Indians in India needed Jindal to come along and put them on the map bewilders me.)

Jindal poignantly represented to Indians, who in many ways remain afflicted by a post-colonial inferiority complex that manifests itself in a yearning for approval from and cultural emulation of the West, that they can compete on the highest levels. But upon reflecting on our automatic, knee-jerk support for Jindal, a key question arises: does he deserve our support as a pioneer for those of South Asian descent in America?

Based on his political views, Jindal doesn’t seem to support the majority of South Asians in America. Jindal’s far right Republican politics, which include fervent opposition to gun control and abortion, as well as heartfelt admiration for the George W. Bush, bear little resemblance to the majority of generally left-leaning second generation South Asian Americans.

But the real issue with Jindal is not so much the fact that he is on the political right. After all, Indian Americans don’t have to be on the political left to retain their culture or remain somehow ‘Indian.’

The real issue with Jindal is that he represents a version of Indian-American that may not be a true step forward for our cause. As a teenager, Jindal abandoned the religion of his parents, Hinduism, and converted to Christianity. He furthermore changed his first name to Bobby from his birth name, Piyush. And his eager acceptance of Indian-American fundraising donations notwithstanding, Jindal furthermore makes no particular effort to associate closely with the Indian American community at large, lest this somehow harm his political ambitions in Louisiana. While this may ultimately have turned out to all have been necessary to stand a chance of being elected in a place like Louisiana, where some level of racism is almost expected, none of this changes the fact that acceptance and progress in the Jindal model comes on terms that we may not necessarily be comfortable with.

After all, is the image that we wish to create of South Asian Americans one of people who are just like white Americans in every single way, except for that annoying little fact that we happen to have brown skin? Or do we wish to be accepted on our terms—as being just as American as anyone else, yet blended with a unique and richly different culture/religion/background/language/etc.? To be clear, I don’t advocate calling Bobby Jindal a “sell out” and opposing him simply because his mold of Indian-American appears to be Indian only in color. This is his choice and we must respect that. However, while I do not feel that it is a reason to oppose him, I do feel that it is a reason to think twice before blindly supporting him.

Amidst the euphoria surrounding Jindal’s campaign in the Indian press last fall, some writers eventually did stop to question whether such excitement was justified. An editorial in the Times of India newspaper in October questioned the hype over Jindal, reflecting that “the irony, of course, is that while the media has enthusiastically adopted the Republican nominee as “one of our own”, it is far from clear whether Mr Jindal shares the same sentiments.”

While asserting that Jindal’s decision to convert to Christianity was indeed his own personal decision, it pointed out that “the more relevant issue concerns Mr Jindal the person and his politics,” since he is “the equivalent of a born-again immigrant who is brown in nothing but his skin color.” The editorial further mused that Jindal “is very unlikely, for instance, to become an active proponent of easier immigration laws for Indians or take India’s side rather than that of the US over the issue of American farm subsidies. Why then are we so keen to corral him as an ‘Indian’ and dub his achievements as a great Indian success story?”

The question of what defines “Indian-ness” is even more relevant in the wake of the recent general election upset in India. Is one Indian in their genes or in their heart? Jindal is genetically Indian, though the Italian-born Sonia Gandhi, who admits that she had scarcely heard of India when as an 18-year-old she met her future husband Rajiv in England, seems to have now become far more Indian in her heart. After all, she managed to win the Indian election largely through appealing to impoverished, rural Indians—who are arguably most “Indian” of all (at least in the sense that they are far less influenced by foreign culture than are the urban, middle and upper classes). Sadly, due to protests from the outgoing government and its far right-wing supporters, in addition to her own concerns for safety, Gandhi decided not to take the post of Prime Minister.

So the question remains: will a victory for Jindal be a victory for Indian-Americans? At this point I’m reminded of the wisdom of the Mahatma Gandhi, arguably the greatest human being South Asia has produced for the world, who always argued that liberation for India achieved through illegitimate (violent) means would be worse than no liberation at all. Louis Fischer, his biographer, explains that Gandhi believed that “if the means corrupted the individual the loss would be greater than the gain.” (The Life of Mahatma Gandhi pg.331).

Likewise, acceptance into mainstream political culture at the expense of our rich cultural heritage is likely worse than no acceptance at all. Indeed, Indian-Americans may soon come to realize that a Jindal victory will be just that: a win for Bobby Jindal alone.