Let me start by posting Sonal Shah’s newly-released statement in full, as one goal of this post is to let readers judge her words for themselves:
I was recently maligned by a professor at a college in Connecticut who wrote an article in CounterPunch accusing me of association with Hindu extremism. Then, a few days ago, former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum, former Republican Senator from Pennsylvania, published an editorial in the Philadelphia Inquirer, to which this site linked, that echoed the CounterPunch accusations. These attacks sadden me, but they share one other thing in common: the accusations are false.
In reaction to these attacks, my closest friends — and many strangers — have rallied to my side. I am touched by this outpouring of support. And as painful as this episode has been for me personally, I welcome the opportunity to discuss this issue with the seriousness that it deserves, but the conversation should proceed on the basis of verified facts and reasoned argument, not innuendo and defamation.
Indian politics and history are contested and emotive, but also unfamiliar to most Americans. I understand why so many Indians and Indian-Americans feel strongly about religious extremism in India, because I share the same concerns.
I am an American, and my political engagements have always and only been American. I served as a U.S. Treasury Department official for seven years, and now work on global development policy at Google.org. And I am honored to serve on the Presidential Transition Team of President-elect Obama while on leave from Google.org.
I emigrated from India at the age of four, and grew up in Houston. Like many Americans, I remain proud of my heritage. But my engagement with India has been exclusively cultural and humanitarian. After the devastating earthquake in Gujarat in 2001, I worked on behalf of a consortium of Indian-American organizations to raise funds for humanitarian relief. The Vishwa Hindu Parishad of America (VHP-A), an independent charity associated with the eponymous Indian political group, was among these organizations, and it was the only one to list my name on its website. I am not affiliated with any of these organizations, including the VHP-A, and have not worked with any of them since 2001.
The experience with the Gujarat earthquake did, however, teach me an important lesson. It pointed up a lack of dedicated infrastructure to help alleviate suffering in India, so together with my brother and sister, I founded Indicorps, an organization modeled on the U.S. Peace Corps that enables young Indian-Americans to spend a year in service to marginalized communities in India. The fellows come from every religious background, and have worked among every religious community in India. Indeed, some Indicorps fellows focus on inter-faith dialogue as part of their projects.
In 2002, Gujarat suffered one of the most profound tragedies in its long history, when extremist political leaders, including some associated with the VHP, incited riots that resulted in the deaths of thousands. Had I been able to foresee the role of the VHP in India in these heinous events, or anticipate that the VHP of America could possibly stand by silently in the face of its Indian counterpart’s complicity in the events of Gujarat in 2002 — thereby undermining the American group’s cultural and humanitarian efforts with which I was involved — I would not have associated with the VHP of America.
Sadly, CounterPunch and Senator Santorum have suggested that I somehow endorse that violence and the ongoing violence in Orissa. I do not – I deplore it. But more than that, I have worked against it, and will continue to do so. I have already denounced the groups at issue and am hopeful that we can begin to have an honest conversation about the ways immigrant and diaspora communities can engage constructively in social and humanitarian work abroad. (link)
I was happy to see a believable account of how Shah’s name appeared on the VHPA website as a coordinator for earthquake relief in 2001. Shah doesn’t specifically address the statements from a VHPA spokesman to the effect of “she was part of our leadership council for three years,” but there is a clear and convincing account of what she now believes about the VHP as an organization in India, as well as a clear statement about Gujarat 2002. I think we should also not overlook the statement “I am an American” that is here: she considers her personal political commitments to be first and foremost oriented to the American political landscape. I think this fact is important to remember whenever we talk about 2nd generation South Asian Americans’ relationships to specific political issues within South Asia.
After the fold, some thoughts following a personal meeting I had with Anand Shah, Sonal Shah’s younger brother, today in Philadelphia.
First, Anand is a pretty intense person — he had a lot to say about the work he and his siblings have done with Indicorps. What came through is a real passion for the kind of work Indicorps does, namely help people find NGOs in India that need hard-working, compassionate people who have skills that can help people all over India. I got the strong sense that Anand would infinitely prefer to be talking about his experiences on that front in India (where he has lived full time since 2002), than dealing with this attack on his sister’s reputation. (Though he is an extremely passionate defender of his sister, don’t get me wrong.)
Second, I get the sense that at least these two Shah siblings are “doers” rather than “talkers.” In our conversation today, Anand repeatedly emphasized his desire to work with people of different political stripes, if it can result in positive outcomes for people in need. He seemed especially impatient with lefty academic types in the U.S., who tend to talk a lot about poverty over dinner at pricey restaurants in New York City. He sees himself bi-partisan in the Obama vein — if a conservative wants to work with him to get something done that will have a positive impact, he’ll go there. These folks are pragmatists, not ideologues.
Third, he stressed the need for second-generation South Asian Americans (the target readership for this blog, incidentally) to take charge of our own self-representation, and not leave it to people like Vijay Prashad. Many of us have complicated affiliations that don’t fit the Indian paradigm of “hardcore religious” or “hardcore secular/Marxist.” For example, some of us have strong connections to religious identity (and associations that come with those strong connections), but nevertheless also would want to be identified as tolerant and progressive when it comes to the broader social order. (I’m thinking of my friends over at blogs like The Langar Hall, or perhaps Ali Eteraz [who has stopped blogging]. And I’m also referring to the religious youth camps that I discussed in my previous post on “Yankee Hindutva”)
Fourth, he agreed with my assessment that all this close attention to an association in Sonal Shah’s past is a bit insane given the gravity of the ongoing communal problem in India, where a person’s political and religious affiliations generally are worn on one’s sleeve. (No one needs to snoop and speculate to find out what you really think; chances are, it’s right out there in the open.)
Sonal Shah, I’ll say again, has never been heard to say anything remotely intolerant — and she’s not exactly been a shrinking violet when it comes to speaking engagements over the past few years. It’s also not clear that she ever did anything for the VHPA other than this role as an earthquake relief coordinator in 2001 (which she describes as only one part of a larger effort involving a consortium of organizations). In her own narrative of this association, as well as her brother’s account of it that I heard in person today, this was not a sustained or major involvement. Their decision to found Indicorps emerged precisely out of a need to establish a mechanism by which second generation Indian Americans could channel their desire to do good secularly, specifically where it would be of real benefit in India.
I hope there is enough evidence out there now that Sonal Shah is not some kind of ideologue for the Hindu right (in fact, she is not an ideologue at all). Moreover, her role as a member of the Obama transition team has had no involvement with policy related to India, so why exactly are we still talking about it?
It’s by the standard of Indicorps that Anand Shah wants to be judged — and I for one am willing to give him that.
I do not understand this statement. Closet religious bigots are a dime a dozen in India. The question is not what your personal religion is, the question is what you believe about people of other religions.
This is a strange statement. Would we be fine putting David Duke in charge of the Asian affairs desk in the Obama administration? Also, how come she has not explained her being a part of the leadership council of the VHP-A? (That is probably the association which should really give people pause as it implies a direct connection with an organization whose Indian shakha has a poisonous reputation over the last couple of decades. It doesn’t lend itself to the facile explanation of her being the person in charge of VHP-A’s Gujarat relief efforts – even if you find the latter convincing.)
To be clear, I am not analogizing Sonal Shah to David Duke, just questioning the notion that her associations with the VHP are moot since her policy involvement does not cover India.
Trying to do good can get you in messy situations. I always joke around with some Sikhs that if any of us ever wanted to run for any office and a reporter came to the Gurdwara, we would be in deep shit because of some Khalistan stuff on the wall’s of the Gurdwara, even though we know absoultly nothing about that stuff.
Seriously if I volunteered for a Sikh run soup kitchen and I ran for office, some one could trace it back to Khalistan terrorists and say that I wroked for an organization that supports terrorism that sucks because I can see it happening to someone.
Trying to do good can get you in messy situations. I always joke around with some Sikhs that if any of us ever wanted to run for any office and a reporter came to the Gurdwara, we would be in deep shit because of some Khalistan stuff on the wall’s of the Gurdwara, even though we know absoultly nothing about that stuff.
Seriously if I volunteered for a Sikh run soup kitchen and I ran for office, some one could trace it back to Khalistan terrorists and say that I wroked for an organization that supports terrorism that sucks because I can see it happening to someone.
ShallowThinker, yes, that’s exactly the point I’m trying to make. The same could be said for me, and maybe even other bloggers here, with their respective religious backgrounds.
She didn’t volunteer for a soup kitchen, she was part of the leadership team. There is a difference. And the history of the VHP’s association with religious violence and mayhem did not begin with 2002 (it goes back at least to Babri Masjid and Bhagalpur in the late 80s), so the exculpatory excuse of lack of prescience combined with the facile explanation of her name being expropriated by VHP’s publicity efforts for its earthquake relief, really insult the intelligence. This statement might be long, but it still wilfully (some might say, deviously) omits any explanation of her being part of the leadership team of the VHP-A and egregiously misleads on the timeline of the VHP’s reputation for communal violence.
the statement by sonal gives me cause for concern. I have commented earlier that this is not a big deal and she is being crucified without reason. But when one ignores a big issue then it raises many flags. Yes, am worried now – has she funded the VHP in India privately ?
there were no riots before this? Please, this is ridiculous. Folks dont get onto the leadership council of any organization – not even your local PTA – without subscribing to the views of that organization. Where is the denouncing of the VHP-A for being silent. How many years was she a member of the VHP-A.
to say is not a crime but to do. Also the VHP-A is not a charitable orgn but the american political arm of a political party in India. seriously, why do proud americans get involved in India.
I dont particularly care about Sonal or her VHP affiliations. There are worse things in India. But the hypocrisy/ doublespeak and lawyerese is bloody annoying. One does not need 3 statements to explain a simple situation.
I don’t think emphasizing being American is a defense, or at least a convincing one. One can be an American and a right-wing, Muslim hating, Hindu ideologue. As a matter of fact, as the American Zionist movement clearly shows, the danger from American ideologues with political clout and will and means are much, much more destructive than marauding crowds with lathis.
Also, I don’t think insulting lefty academics is a great way to go about arguing. Fine, Sonal Shah and her brother are doers, whatever that means. No one is arguing that those two are lazy. The issue is WHAT they are doing. If they are on executive boards of this right wing organization, then there is no way they are ignorant of the role VHPA has had in inciting communal violence. If these two are such active doers, then there is no excuse for their affiliation with such a hate-filled organization.
Were there no other organizations involved with earthquake relief? Of course there were. Why go with such a divisive organization? Does Sonal Shah feel that her charity should only go to Hindus? Maybe. Nothing wrong with that, but she shouldn’t try to argue for lack of preference then for certain communities.
Evidence, please? I am in VHP-A. And I don’t recall any incitment to communal violence in India happening.
Also, the notion that living in America from the age of 4, somehow would mean that she is sublimely innocent of the track record of the VHP and its cohorts, especially when her father has always been intimately involved with these organizations throughout his life, even to the extent of campaigning for Advani in 2004 and participating in his yatras at that time, is ridiculous. To be clear, I do not hold her responsible for her father’s associations or beliefs, but it beggars belief that she had no idea what the beliefs and actions of the VHP, cocooned in the pristine, unsullied suburbs of Houston.
Is any Hindu who is not a lefty “guilty”?!
I guess one has to assume that the VHP-A’s silence about the VHP participation in communal riots in Orissa, Gujarat, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, and so on, were purely because of ignorance. And sharing the name? That’s just an accident!
Excellent deflection, but the charge against Sonal is not that she’s a Hindu.
I always joke around with some Sikhs that if any of us ever wanted to run for any office and a reporter came to the Gurdwara, we would be in deep shit because of some Khalistan stuff on the wall’s of the Gurdwara, even though we know absoultly nothing about that stuff.
Shallowthinker by any chance do you work at the Gurdwara in Stockton,Calfornia.
Thanks–they don’t pay me the big buck for nothing! But, one way of looking at it is that the charge is that she’s not cowering in some lefty group, ‘even though’ she’s a Hindu. Why is the only “appropriate” way of being a Hindu to be a leftist? If I favor free markets and so am attracted to the BJP, suddenly I’m responsible for communal violence? Nice.
Yes, I guess you call it one way of looking at it.
Rick Santorum is a hypocrite for speculating about the tenuous link of an Obama appointee to right-wing Hindu groups responsible for the suffering of Christian and Muslim minorities in faraway India. After all, Mr Santorum prominently continues to anguish the mostly-Christian Hispanic and Muslim minorities right here in America.
For example, during the Republican presidential primary, Santorum famously lent his voice to a robo-call on behalf of Mitt Romney, who had vowed to deport all undocumented immigrants, to attack Sen. McCain for authoring Comprehensive Immigration Reform. The bill would have provided much-awaited relief to many Hispanic immigrants who have risked lives and long separations from loved ones to come to this nation of immigrants and work at its hardest jobs. Does Mr Santorum regret the injury he has caused his fellow Christians?
Also, earlier this year, Rick Santorum spoke at colleges across America, and as part of his discourse inferred Islam is a fundamentally violent religion. Is this Rick Santorum’s idea of making America’s Muslim minority feel at home?
There’s a proverb in Hindi/Urdu which accurately arrests Santorum’s present behavior in very few words:
Sau chuhe kha ke billi haj ko chali.
I think it is not an appropriate way to be a decent human being to be supportive of organizations that incite and participate in communal violence from the top down, and push for a divisive theocratic national vision. If the VHP is the only organization that allows expression of Hindu-ness, then that should be considered a sign of moral bankruptcy in Hindu leadership, the way, many rightly condemn the Islamic community for not providing moderate, peaceful leadership and role models for their co-religionists. If you call this viewpoint leftist, then so be it.
I’m glad she put this out, though I’m not a huge fan of either of her hecklers on the fringes. Now, Sonal, help make our government work again? Please?
are you sure ? If it were proved that she has funded the VHP in India privately, would you then agree that she is a Hindutva activist ? Can she confirm that she has never funded the VHP in India? VHP has been a riot friendly organzation for several decades.
And apparently, the same applies to Sonal Shah too, given the masterpiece of smoke and mirrors that is her statement. (BTW, if it wasn’t clear, #15 was a comment in the same tone as your quoted remark above.)
I look at this very strongly in the “innocent until proven guilty” category. It is unfair to ask somebody to disprove unprovable allegations. This statement is very similar to the innuendo against Obama by the fringe Christian right wingers during the presidential election.
(I think there is a lot to question about Sonal Shah purely based on her known actions, her refusal to explain them, and her persistent dissimulations about them.)
I dont work at any Gurdwara and to tell you the truth I am not that religous, but whats up with the Gurdwara in Stockton?
I am not going to pretend like I know anything about the VHP, but if this group is like any other Indian group then I bet they saw someone with a powerful name and said “Hey, why dont we say she is on our board to give us a little more prestige. I am sure she wont mind because I know her father.”
I find it hard to believe that this little woman is all about Hindu domination, but I could be wrong.
rajesh – yes she is innocent until proven guilty. She was on the VHP-A board – that means she subscribed to the views of the VHP-A which includes murder and riots in the 1990s. And if she has funded the VHP since then it means that she continues to subscribe to the VHP.
Again – dont care if someone is an activist. Just dont pretend that it is not so.
My point is that this is an unjustified leap of logic (and unnecessary). I agree with your first part – the VHP-A lists Ram Janmabhoomi as a signal event in its history on its webpage, and its founding leadership participates in global VHP leadership conclaves in India. To claim that the VHP-A is a pacifist organization completely disjoint with the VHP’s actions in India, and beset with the unfortunate accident of a name, is insulting to people’s intelligence.
18 · rajesh said
It’s really sounding to me like you’re going to hammer her for not being politically aligned with India’s lefty wing. And you’re willing to pull guilt by association tactics to tar her because, apparently, being associated with a Hindu group is just repugnant to you even though the VHPA doesn’t really do any of that crap you’re accusing it of. The fact that it has an affiliation with the VHP proper somehow makes it heinous.
I still want somebody to show me a single group of any stripe or shape in India that is perfectly lily-White in all its dealings. Are any of India’s holier-than-thou lefties willing to take a good look at the Congress party’s racketeering and use of murder and intimidation as well as its willingness to work with violent communists and insurrectionists when it suits them? Of course not. It’s not a convenient ideological bludgeon for them.
So, let me get this straight. Each Muslim organization that did not openly condemn the recent attacks on Mumbai by Muslims is, by extension, complicit in said attacks. Right?
Not to be defend Sonal Shah because I don’t know her from Adam, but can some of you be a little more sensitive and subtle in your appreciation of complicity?
I also love how the money I donated for Tsunami relief in Tamil-Nadu is probably going to somehow mean I secretly support the LTTE or some other garbage.
I went to see William Ayers speak at a seminar once too. So clearly I must hate America as well.
VHP-A is not comparable with a podunk Muslim organization in the context of the activities of the VHP in India, nor was Sonal Shah a low level party functionary of the VHP-A. These are important points.
28 · NaraVara said
If you chose the charity arm of the LTTE to funnel money your tsunami related charity through, there are some who might look askance at that decision.
28 · NaraVara said
Hey, why stop there? You once breathed a molecule of air that passed through Osama Bin Laden’s system, so you were complicit in 9/11. Because these are exactly the analogies we are talking about here, aren’t we?
27 · Maitri said
Maitri, she was in the leadership of VHPA for at least 3 years, possibly longer. If you’re in the leadership of the American franchise of a group, and you don’t say anything about that group’s misdeeds until you have your arm twisted, and even then you complain about having to do so … well, what conclusion would you draw?
The right analogy here isn’t some “muslim organization” but rather the leadership of L-e-T-America.
Let me phrase it in terms of domestic politics – what would you assume about state leaders of the GoP? Unless they say otherwise, you assume that they share their party’s national platform, right? Why is that an unsubtle understanding? There is a direct organizational tie. If you don’t believe in the GoP’s national platform, then don’t lead a state party.
I dont work at any Gurdwara and to tell you the truth I am not that religous, but whats up with the Gurdwara in Stockton?
I’m not religous also. I want to my 1st cousin wedding in Stockton a three years ago, and all I remember about the wedding were pictures on the wall of all these sikhs with machine guns and other Khalistan propaganda. Plus during the wedding the one of the guy who runs the gurdwara want off some half-hour khalistan rant in the middle of the summer with no air conditioning, despite the fact he had promised my uncle before the wedding that he wouldn’t[This was after the part where they already had gotten married].
It got so bad that I had to walk up to front and point at my watch and tell the guy to hurry it up.
28 · NaraVara said
Naravara – were you in the leadership of the LTTE-America? Were you a member of Friends of the Weathermen?
It’s easy enough to defend Sonal on the issues people are questioning her about. Why is it her defenders feel a need to throw up chaff? She was a leader and a fundraiser. She might have done this innocently or she might have done this in full agreement with the VHPs broader aims. We can’t know because she wont speak to this issue. Instead she keeps saying she just did fundraising to help the victims (and even there doesn’t explain why she raised money for one group (which spent it in a discriminatory fashion) and not another one).
And even if she did everything she did out of ignorance, is this really the level of due diligence you want from an administration official?
34 · Memory said
yes!
Um. . . because the one she was working for was the most effective one of the bunch? Seriously. Why should she raise money for an inferior organization?
She had a job she wanted to get done and she got it done. The real question isn’t why Sonal Shah’s supporters “throw up chaff” (which seems to consist of calling out the idiocy of guilt by association hit-jobs), the question is “Why do lefties with axes to grind against Hindu Orgs insist on trying to claim that anyone with any affiliation with any Hindu Org ever must be evil communalists?” Because that’s really what’s going on here. You can’t participate in your culture (which is all the VHPA is) without being accused of all sorts of monstrous atrocities by wingers with no ability to comprehend nuance.
We’re going back to the basic question. Point out to me a single org in India that has its hands clean. Just one will do.
36 · NaraVara said
i do hope all y’all donate money to hezbollah and hamas to support the poor, deprived children in the middle east this holiday season. their social works program is by far the most effective in the region.
I asked some of my friends who were active as members and coordinators in the Midwest chapters of VHPA and OFBJP during 90s. None of them say they had heard of Sonal. It would be hard for them not to have known the names of national governing council members of VHPA. But that is not surprising. Because VHPA is a loosely held organization, especially at projects level. Their coordination committees are project and event-specific that draw people from general public ie. like a local youth conference might have coordinators who are not members of VHPA and perhaps wouldn’t know VHPA as anything more than a Hindu organization. A project committee might have one VHPA full-timer while all other people would participate only because they are drawn to a specific cause or event and have nothing to do with VHPA. Their names might show up as contacts in the advertisement and pamphlets, but that is the only extent of their involvement. To pin such people to VHPA, and VHPA to VHP, and VHP to communual violence that no courts in India have been able to blame on VHP, seems so too far fetched. It is clear, no matter how many clarifications Sonal issues, it will never convince people who have found a lightening rod in Sonal, not because what she is, but because what they think VHPA is.
It’s strange that a technocrat would choose not to highlight the financial opacity of the joint relief effort in Gujarat and instead identify what is, AFAIK, a fairly well-known obstacle to post-disaster relief efforts anywhere in south asia.
It’s time to ask whether anyone who was in Gujarat after the earthquake and participated in relief efforts actually knew who ‘the boss’ was when it came time to distribute funds and supplies and whether this ‘boss’ was really in charge.
There are many “assistant vice presidents” in my workplace–and eventually they become “vice presidents” without any significant increase in salary and definitely no additional authority or power.
What could Sonal have possibly done as ‘part of the leadership council’ as the unnamed VHP official alleges. What information could she possibly have been privy to that was unavailable to the general public? Where is the time-line establishing that she was allegedly part of the leadership council while the 2002 massacre was ongoing?
38 · kp said
case closed! what more proof does one need?
so, you support pakistan not banning jamaat and allowing hafeez saeed to roam the streets freely?
37 · liberal said
So is this the new Godwin’s law? Let’s just accuse organizations of being terrorists without actually justifying the claim. If you repeat the assertion enough and find enough PhDs willing to peddle your line it’ll be true by repetition.
39 · Nayagan said
Repeat: Her claim about the VHP’s to-be-formed reputation for communal violence is a lie.
whaat? i would never call vhp and narendra modi terrorists! i mean, what could they possibly have done to inspire such allegations?
People– the analogies to the LTTE and Hamas fail. There is a reason that the latter are illegal while the VHP is legal. Namely, it’s a crime to be a terrorist, but not a crime to be a non-commie Hindu.
42 · rajesh said
Repeat. Nobody outside the left-wingnut camp gives a damn. Not even a little. The fact that Desis end up finding common cause with Rick Santorum against a fellow Desi for raising money for earthquake relief should be telling. Rick “Man on dog” Santorum. Think about it.
I mean, the accusation isn’t even that she’s done bad things. The accusation is that she did a good thing through an organization that is affiliated with another organization that is accused of doing bad things. Do you people not realize how absurd it is to attack someone on that?
43 · liberal said
Not terrorism. Not good things, but also not “terrorism.” You can throw loaded language around all day if you like though. It is much easier than actually having a point.
Read.
the reason the VHP and Bajrang Dal are not banned is because Hindus are a big voting bloc, and no government has the spine to do what is necessary. you can take refuge in delusional statements about being persecuted for being a non-commie hindu if that gives you comfort, however. people who defend the vhp are no better than those who defend abortion clinic bombers or muslim riot mobs that burn buildings for cartoons, or engage in far far worse.
45 · NaraVara said
and you rail against “guilt by association”? apparently, a foolish consistency is indeed the hobgoblin of little minds.
hezbollah charitable arm.
thanks for clarifying. i’ll keep that in mind.
45 · NaraVara said
you mean: i am going to call anybody who gives a damn a member of the left-wingnut camp.
44 · rob said
The wounded Hanuman act is wearing thin, old chum. If you told me that you had donated to the TRO, even a few years ago, I would have simply called you a ‘madayan’ and let it go. If the ‘non-commie’ Hindus, as you put it, were really ONLY about creating wealth via free markets, would they really have sat and watched as Gujarat imploded? Massacre is not part of Schumpeter’s plan and you know it.
It really is a shame that it has to be pointed out that that the VHP is a mainstraim political organization in India. It is definately not a terroist organization, and by Indian standards is peaceful. For example it has had has less voilence on its hands than other mainstream parties. Even a cursory knowledge of Indian parties — Amar Singh’s SP, the Congress, DMK, Lalu’s RJD, CPI-M, etc, should make that apparent. (The congress in the 70s embarked on a delibrate policy of inducting crminals and gangsters into their leadership, the other parties followed suit)
But for all that all parties have a few good leaders. Also to get anyting done in India, political clout is needed. It should not be a mark of shame that someone served in a leadership position in a organization connected to a political party.
BTW to the “liberals” out there, would there be a similar reaction if someone who worked with ASHA got nominated tommorow. I seriously doubt it. And ASHA/AID,has more direct links to terror than VHPA.
(Sandeep Pandey, the founder of ASHA, and sometimes beneficiary of ASHA’s funds, supports the Naxalite movement, which MMS considers to be the biggest threat to India).
Ms. Shah is now playing with fire. This “defense” is glib about the most crucial areas of interest, and tables a series of red herrings about being American which will distract no one.
A certain fingers-in-ears arrogance and denial is becoming evident in Ms. Shah’s reactions, and those of her brother’s, which also pervades Amardeep’s rather shallow protestations on her behalf.
If this small but vocal lobbying group expects to prevail in sustaining Ms. Shah’s public career prospects, it will have to jettison its shallow and unconvincing either-or rhetoric about “the Indian paradigm”, the brushback vilification of Vijay Prashad (who is among the most serious and insightful analysts of Indians in America, and not some cartoon FOB), and rectify plenty of other miscalculations besides. So far, they’re doing a really bad job, and collectively come off as naive at best.