On the final night of his visit to Washington in late June, after 15 conspicuous White House appearances at Congress and a White House dinner catering to his vegetarian tastes, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi set time to court and be cheered by another key constituency: the Indian diaspora.
Backstage at the Kennedy Center, as business leaders dressed in tailored suits and fine silk sarees filtered into the 1,200-seat theater, Mr. Modi met with a handful of businessmen. Most were young, educated in India, wealthy in America, and eager to connect with the man who would present himself as a guru to the world, preaching that this would be “India’s century.”
“Thank you for lifting the image and spirit of Indian Americans,” Umesh Sachdev, 37, told the prime minister, explaining that he is the founder of Unifor, a $2.5 billion artificial intelligence business with offices in India and California. Mr. Modi patted Mr. Sachdev on the shoulder and exclaimed “wah” or wow in Hindi.
With an emphasis on national pride, Mr Modi and his conservative Hindu-first Bharatiya Janata Party have cultivated surprisingly strong ties with India’s successful diaspora. Bonds are strengthened by the global political machine led by Mr. Modi, with party offices in dozens of countries and thousands of volunteers. And it has allowed Mr. Modi to fuse his own image and his rubric of elevating India with superstar executives and powerful, often more liberal constituencies in America, Britain, Australia and many other countries.
No other world leader seems to have drawn such a steady stream of diaspora welcome parties, with giant audiences including 20,000 fans recently in Paris, New York and Cairo, or at a rally in Australia in May. Mr Modi was in France on Friday as the guest of honor at the annual Bastille Day parade and set a precedent for elections in India next year.
“The BJP leadership wants to project its power abroad, to create power at home,” said Sameer Lalwani, senior South Asia expert at the US Institute of Peace.
But in some corners of the diaspora, strains are emerging. While Mr. Modi, who is excited about new infrastructure and more modern cities, boasts that India is the world’s fifth-largest economy, many Indian professionals fear that his government’s Hindu-hegemonic policies and growing intolerance of scrutiny will really alienate India. Stands as a superpower and democratic alternative to China.
Vinod Khosla, a prominent Silicon Valley investor who often pushes for US-India ties, said in an interview that India’s biggest risk is that economic growth will be hampered by instability and inequality fueled by Hindu nationalism. Others worry that Mr. Modi is ignoring the fragility of positive momentum in a bubble of political celebrity and religious authenticity in a complex, diverse and volatile nation of 1.4 billion people.
Arun Subramani, a Washington-based private equity banker with digital, healthcare and other investments in India, said, “Demographics will only work for India if there is progressiveness and inclusiveness.” “The party needs to do more to make it clear that India is for everyone.”
Techno-Utopian Dreams
The bond between the diaspora and the BJP began with pragmatism – and with Atal Bihari Vajpayee, the first BJP prime minister, who promoted information technology as a solution to India’s development problems in the late 1990s.
Kanwal Rekhi, the first Indian American to take a company public on Nasdaq, Mr. Listened to Vajpayee’s speeches and thought: This guy gets it. He sought a meeting and arrived in New Delhi in April 2000, leading a group called The Indus Entrepreneurs, or TYE.
At the Prime Minister’s residence, there were paratroopers on the roof and tanks nearby, traces of the recent conflict with Pakistan. Mr. Rekhi promised that entrepreneurship can bridge the divides – India and Pakistan, Muslims and Hindus. Shri Vajpayee welcomed his techno-utopianism.
“He asked: ‘What do you feel about India and Indians?’ Then he said, ‘Our future is very bright, and you have to show us the way,'” Mr. Rekhi said in an interview.
So those who left with university degrees began to engage with the diaspora when they were seen as traitors to India’s needs. Once Mr. Vajpayee made it clear that he saw overseas Indians as mentors and advisers, that he became.
TiE made several recommendations, which were reinforced by Stanford professors and Mr. Vajpayee’s suggestions were followed. In 2001, for example, his government loosened its monopoly on Internet infrastructure, allowing more private competition.
Naren Bakshi, another tech executive at the meetings, recalled that Mr. Vajpayee insisted that the diaspora also play a direct role.
“If you care about India, come to India,” he told them.
Mr. Bakshi bought a house near where he grew up in the state of Rajasthan and has since spent four months a year in India.
In the early 2000s, he helped found the India Community Center in Milpitas, Calif., a sprawling complex in the South Asian suburb of San Jose that is a center for yoga, Muslim and Hindu holidays, weddings — and much more. with visiting Indian officials.
“People here are very involved,” Raj Desai, the center’s president, said over tea one recent morning.
In Silicon Valley and elsewhere, the BJP’s overseas friends, the party’s international arm, are an established presence. By helping with immigration issues and other challenges, its members complement and compete with India’s undermanned corps of about 950 foreign service officers — a fraction of the roughly 16,000 who work for the United States.
Last year — even though voting in India’s elections had to be done in person — according to BJP-sponsored events with party officials in Texas, New Jersey, Washington, DC and North Carolina, as well as several events held at the India Community Center in California. to its mandatory registration filings as a foreign agent.
Visiting officers also gather small groups for lunch and discussion. Mr Sachdev, the Unifor chief executive, who has been to several such gatherings, said the conversations focused on business ethics rather than politics.
He and others present said they were never asked to contribute to BJP campaigns.
But political scientists believe that the BJP and Hindu organizations draw significant inflows of money from the diaspora. In 2018, Mr. Modi’s government rushed a law through Parliament to allow undisclosed political donations to Indians living abroad and foreign companies with subsidiaries in India. India’s 2019 campaign expenditure exceeded $8 billion, making it the most expensive election in the world.
“There is an absence of transparency, and this is by design,” said Gilles Verniers, a senior fellow at the Center for Policy Research in New Delhi.
In the United States, the BJP made its presence felt — as any foreign political party would — in Houston in 2019 by President Donald J. It registered only after raising questions about financing the giant “Howdy Modi” celebration with Trump.
In Australia, the firm has not appeared on the Foreign Transparency Register, despite spending related to Modi’s May rally at Sydney’s Qudos Bank Arena, where hundreds of people formed a giant sign for selfies. Along with “We ❤️ Modi” in bright white lights.
“He is the leader of the century,” Meera Rawat said after posing for a photo with the cardboard Modi.
Her group reached Sydney in a bus hired by the local BJP chapter. Several planes were also chartered by the party.
BJP officials in Australia, when asked about the process, said everything was “fully funded by the local Indian community and businesses”.
Albel Singh Kang, secretary of the Australian Sikh Association, said his group was initially recruited for the event. When organizers refused to recognize its funding, they passed. Indian Muslim leaders stayed away, with members of Mr Modi’s party calling for the killing of Muslims – without a strong rebuke from the prime minister.
Pushing for change
Many Indians abroad worry about bloodshed in India, where religious minorities make up 20 percent of the population and regularly accuse Hindu groups of beating up people, mostly Muslims, for their food, dress style or interfaith marriages. But migrant families in India worry about violence in the countries they have moved to.
In 2021, four Sikh students were attacked in a car in Sydney by men armed with bats and hammers. After one of the men served a six-month sentence, he returned to India, where he received a hero’s welcome. Tensions between Indian expatriates in Britain, Canada and the United States have been rising in recent years, along with vandalism and threats.
“The fact is, there are divisions in India, and they are bound to express themselves because politics does not stop at national shores,” said C. Raja Mohan said.
Growing concerns about polarization are often overlooked amid the Modi show. At a diaspora event in Sydney, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese likened Mr Modi to Bruce Springsteen, calling the Indian leader “The Boss”.
In Washington, where 7,000 Indian Americans celebrated with him on the White House lawn, Mr. Modi told a news conference that discrimination against minorities would not exist under his government. A few hours later, human rights activists, including Muslims who had fled to the United States after facing persecution in India, gathered outside the gate. The TV crew had already left.
Behind the scenes, US officials say Mr Modi has been largely distracted.
Ro Khanna, co-chairman of the Congressional Caucus on India and Indian Americans, who represents the district that includes the India Community Center, said he spoke with Mr. Modi about the importance of pluralism.
“I want us to focus more on strengthening the US-India relationship under the principles of India’s founding and our founding, and not the celebration of any particular person,” Mr Khanna said.
Some business leaders say Mr Modi deserves their unwavering support. “What matters to me is, are they capable of putting India on the path of growth and global leadership?” said Mr. Sachdev of Unifor. The United Nations recently reported that India’s economy has lifted 415 million people out of poverty in the last 15 years.
Others have begun to mix praise with practical concern. Major investor Mr. Khosla said it was time to recognize that the government’s pandering to Hindus “could distract from the important path of economic progress and set it back and set back global relations”.
Even among Washington’s supportive diaspora crowd, there was a mix of pride and moderation for equal opportunity and constructive criticism.
Mr. Subramani, a private equity banker, said he grew up in a compound of 10 families practicing four different religions without common running water or electricity in southern India. He called Mr. Modi a “very quick learner” who would hopefully defend India’s more tolerant values.
“It is our responsibility, people who support Modi, are inspired by what is happening in India,” he said. “It is our duty to replace him.”
Sonia Paul contributed reporting from Santa Clara, California and Karan Deep Singh from New Delhi.
