4 Indian-Americans win state, local elections in US
Washington: Four Indian-Americans, including a Muslim woman and a former White House technology policy advisor, have won state and local elections held in the United States on Tuesday.
Indian-American Ghazala Hashmi, a former community college professor, created history by becoming the first Muslim woman to be elected to the Virginia State Senate, while Suhas Subramanyam, who served as the White House technology policy adviser to former president Barack Obama, has been elected to the Virginia State House of Representative.
In her maiden attempt, Hashmi, a Democrat, defeated incumbent Republican State Senator Glen Sturtevant for the Virginia's 10th Senate District, drawing national attention.
"This victory is not mine alone. It belongs to all of you who believed that we needed to make progressive change here in Virginia, for all of you who felt that you haven't had a voice and believed in me to be yours in the General Assembly," she said after her historic victory.
Former secretary of state Hillary Clinton, who was the first woman presidential candidate, congratulated Hashmi.
"I also want to shout out @Hashmi4Va, the first Muslim woman elected to the VA State Senate. As she said yesterday, her victory 'belongs to all of you who believed that we needed to make progressive change here in Virginia, for all of you who felt that you haven't had a voice'," Clinton said in a tweet.
Hashmi, who had moved to the US from India as a young girl with her family 50 years ago, responded, saying, "I am deeply honoured by your words, Secretary Clinton. You broke so many glass ceilings for women in public service."
Hashmi was raised in a small town in Georgia and saw firsthand how community-building and open dialogue can bridge cultural and socioeconomic divisions, uniting people from all walks of life. She earned a BA in English from Georgia Southern University and a PhD from Emory University.
She and her husband, Azhar, moved to the Richmond area in 1991. Hashmi has spent the past 25 years as a leading educator in Virginia's college and university system. She currently serves as the founding director of the Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning (CETL) at Reynolds Community College.
"After flipping the Senate, I'll have Democrats by my side to fight to protect Virginians from the climate crisis and senseless gun violence, and work to expand our access to affordable health care and funding for public education. I can't wait to work together in the state Senate," Hashmi said.
Subramanyam, meanwhile, entered the Virginia State House of Representatives from the Indian-American-dominated district of Loudon and Prince William.
"My promise to the people of Loudoun and Prince William: I will always listen to you, work tirelessly for you, and do everything I can to empower you. The campaign is over, but my work for you has just begun," he said.
His mother, a native of Bengaluru in India, had immigrated to the United States in 1979. She landed in Dulles airport to start a new life and went on to become a physician and raise a family.
Subramanyam served on Capitol Hill as a healthcare and veterans policy aide, and spent time as a technology and regulatory attorney. Former US president Barack Obama had named him his White House technology policy adviser.
In this capacity, he led a task force on technology policy that Obama charged with addressing some of the country's most challenging technology issues, including job creation and displacement in the technology sector, regulating emerging technology, and addressing cybersecurity and IT modernisation in the public sector.
In California, Indian-American Mano Raju won his election to remain San Francisco's Public Defender.
Raju attended Columbia University as an undergraduate where he researched Critical Race Theory under Professor Kendall Thomas. After an influential fellowship at the Oxford Center for African Studies, he relocated to Berkeley in the 90s to pursue his Masters in South Asian Studies and later his JD at Berkeley School of Law, where he interned in the San Francisco Public Defender's Office.
In North Carolina, incumbent Dimple Ajmera won a convincing re-election to Charlotte City Council. A former Certified Public Accountant, Ajmera immigrated to the US from India along with her parents when she was 16. At that time, she spoke no English. Proving her tenacity, she went on to graduate from the University of Southern California (USC) and later became a Certified Public Accountant (CPA).
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Uttarakhand Assembly passes censure motion against opposition over women's reservation bill
Dehradun (PTI): The Uttarakhand Assembly passed a censure motion against the Congress and other opposition parties on Tuesday for allegedly blocking the passage of the Constitution (131st Amendment) Bill, 2026, in Parliament.
The motion, which expressed the House's formal disapproval of the opposition's conduct, triggered a massive uproar by Congress members, leading to the adjournment of the House sine die.
Parliamentary Affairs Minister Subodh Uniyal moved the censure motion, citing the "uncooperative attitude" of opposition parties toward the bill seeking 33 per cent reservation for women in legislative bodies.
Addressing a special daylong session convened specifically to discuss "Nari Samman -- Rights in Democracy", Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami said the bill's passage would have benefitted every political party.
Dhami noted that after delimitation, the number of Assembly seats in the hill state would have gone up to 105, with 35 reserved for women. He added that the number of Lok Sabha seats from Uttarakhand would have risen from five to seven or eight.
"The opposition fears that if women from ordinary households enter politics, the shops of dynastic politics run by certain parties will shut down," the chief minister claimed.
He compared the opposition's conduct in Parliament to the assembly in Mahabharat where Draupadi was insulted. Dhami further likened the opposition's behaviour to the "arrogance of Ravan".
The chief minister highlighted his government's initiatives, asserting that Uttarakhand was the first state to implement a Uniform Civil Code (UCC) to protect women's rights. He said the UCC freed Muslim women from practices like "halala", "iddat", polygamy and child marriage.
Leader of Opposition Yashpal Arya questioned the technical feasibility of the bill, calling the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) claims of providing reservation by 2029 "misleading".
He argued that the bill is linked to census and delimitation processes. The Congress leader said the 2026 census would conclude by 2027 and the final data publication would take two more years.
"The delimitation process will take another six years. The actual implementation of this bill is not possible before 2034," Arya said, describing the move as a strategy to protect the BJP's "political ground".
The session also saw high drama outside the Assembly gates, where Congress MLA Virendra Jati staged a protest, demanding the payment of "outstanding" dues to farmers by sugar mills.
Jati arrived at the Assembly's main gate with a tractor-trolley loaded with sugarcane and dumped it on the road. The move brought the traffic to a halt, prompting traffic and security personnel to intervene and clear the area.
Women Congress workers also staged a demonstration against the "anti-people policies" of the state government.
