Jewish American Heritage Month

Posted By admin on September 8, 2022

In the event, Rishi Sunak was pipped at the post in the British PM Stakes. A win would have earned him a place in history as the first person of Indian origin, with an Indian passport-holder spouse to boot, to occupy Number Ten, Downing Street.

However, his near triumph will give rise to much self-congratulatory celebration among the Indian community, in the UK as well as here in India.

We Indians love to bask in the limelight of vicarious victory as represented by the success stories of emigres who share our ethnicity, no matter at what remove and however tenuously, and in whatever field of endeavour, from politics to sport, science to literature, commerce to academics.

And thanks to the Great Indian Diaspora which according to a 2020 UN report comprises some 18 million people and is the largest immigrant community in the world there is no dearth of our proxy compatriots to win accolades and esteem in various walks of life, all over the globe.

Even as Sunak Dishy Rishi almost made it to the British premiership, Indian media were agog with the news that the Biden administration in the US has no fewer than 130 Indian-origin occupiers of high public office, covering a wide range of professional expertise, from economics to healthcare and social services.

Wow. Good for them. Heck, good for us, being their ethnic kinfolk, so to speak. Or is it so good for us? While we celebrate the accomplishments of all such people of Indian descent who, in alien environments, have won fame, or fortune, or both, we might pause to reflect on what it was that caused them, or their forebears, to leave India, denying it their talents to the benefit of their adoptive countries.

Why are our best and brightest brains getting drained, to our national loss and to the gain of foreign lands where the pastures of opportunity are perceived to be greener?

Maybe along with Make in India we should have a parallel Retain in India, or even Return to India. That would be a ghar wapsi, in which we truly could take pride.

Views expressed above are the author's own.

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Originally posted here:

Proxy Indians: Diaspora success stories should give rise not to rejoicing but to regret for talent lost to us - Times of India

Category: Diaspora
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