In April this year, in an informal tete-a-tete at a California fundraiser, Barack Obama casually referred to a visit he had made to Pakistan during his college days, a sojourn that had never been mentioned before in public — not even in his two best-selling autobiographies. It turned out that he had a couple of Pakistani friends during his identity-forming, collegiate years, and on the way back from visiting his mother and half-sister in Indonesia once, he had stopped by in Pakistan and spent three weeks in Karachi and Hyderabad in Sind.
Obama recalled this trip by way of maintaining he had fundamental foreign exposure from the ground up, going back a long way into his youth, unlike his more distinguished all-American Senate colleagues and political rivals, Republican John McCain and fellow Democrat Hillary Clinton. That, in addition to his mixed heritage and composite identity, he suggested, gave him better foreign policy grounding than his rivals, whose knowledge of foreign countries consisted largely of token official visits. In fact, Obama took a dig at the recently exposed ignorance among US politicians about the Islamic world, saying he knew the difference between Shia and Sunni long before he joined the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
But his own staff, despite its considerable ethnic variety, misread his comments (at least geographically), and told the media that he had travelled to Karachi, Sind, and Hyderabad, India. In part, this misunderstanding arose because they knew of another Obama friend from India during his college days, Andhraite Vinai Thummalapally. However, it turned out despite his close friendship with Thummalapally, and his considerable knowledge of the subcontinent, he hadn’t visited Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh. It was Hyderabad, Sind, which he visited.
Today, Thummalapally remains a good friend, besides being one of Obama’s "bundlers", the term used for anyone raising $100,000-plus for his campaign. President of Mam-A Inc, a mid-western company that makes blank CDs and DVDs, Thummalapally recalls how he and Obama discussed world issues and politics when they ran together (for exercise, not for office) even back in the 1980s when they roomed together. The Indian entrepreneur not only attended Obama’s wedding in 1992 but has kept in touch with him throughout his career, and is counted today as one of his close associates going beyond politics. "In his Senate office, you will find a picture of Mahatma Gandhi next to one of Martin Luther King," says Thummalapally, maintaining that Obama’s familiarity with the region is considerable.
Of course, several Democrat politicians, including Senate and House leaders Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi, keep Gandhi busts or pictures in their office. The husband-and-wife Clintons, who too are well-read in subcontinental history, also speak eloquently about Gandhi. But here’s a trivial observation that suggests why Obama, because of his eclectic and unusual upbringing, may be different: He’s the only American leader who has been heard to pronounce Gandhi and Pakistan correctly — just like it’s pronounced in the subcontinent (Gaan-dhi, not Gain-dee; Paak-isthaan, not Pack-is-tan). In other conversations, Obama has also referred to Indian success in technology fields, and drawn comparisons between his father (who came to the US "without money, but with a student visa and a determination to succeed") and the experiences of Indian immigrants.
Such empathy and "connection" to immigrants from the subcontinent is only one part of Obama’s plural multi-ethnic background and wide-ranging eclectic education (American, African, even part-Asian) that makes him arguably the most unusual and exciting presidential candidate in US history — more universalist than American. In his first book, Dreams from My Father, written nearly a decade ago even before he came to Washington DC as a senator, Obama recalls the wanderlust of his mother (a white woman from Kansas who married a Kenyan exchange student) that took her to marketplaces as far apart as Marrakesh and New Delhi. He recounts his own experiences in Kenya and Indonesia, home of his biological father and stepfather respectively, including the turbulent politics of these boiling Third World countries he saw during his visits. His worldview even in those days was imbued with travels and exposures to such Third World hotspots, a clear departure from the more Atlanticist upbringing of his white contemporaries. To this day, he carries on his person, among other things, a small metal figure of Hanuman, having become familiar with the Ramayana during his days in Indonesia.
It’s this kind of exciting, open-minded, expansive outlook and intellectual growth that has drawn droves of young, idealistic first and second generation Americans, including Indian-Americans, to the Obama fold. Despite the common belief that recent immigrants are typically pro-Democrat (the proposition is questionable now, especially among wealthy Indians), and a majority of Indian-Americans back Hillary Clinton, it turns out that Obama has had significant support among Indians in this election cycle. Thummalapally aside, prominent Obama supporters include New York investment banker Anilesh Ahuja and Ohio legal eagle Subodh Chandra. Among his advisers on foreign policy and immigration are policy wonk Parag Khanna and legal eagle Preeta Bansal. South Asians for Barack Obama (SABO) was in the thick of action as much as Indian-Americans for Hillary Clinton (IAHC).
Obama’s idealism and verve has drawn young Indian-Americans like the actor Kal Penn (of Harold and Kumar fame), who confesses an aversion to politics before the young senator bounded on the national platform. "I’m not a registered Democrat, and I’ve never gotten motivated before, mostly because I wasn’t a fan of the political establishment," the actor previously known as Kalpen Mody explained recently. "But I was really inspired by Barack. I haven’t been that inspired since hearing my grandparents tell stories about marching with Gandhi."
Indeed, even a hardened political commentator like Newsweek International editor, Mumbai-born Fareed Zakaria, admitted that he empathized with Obama and his sense of personal identity. "There’s a debate taking place about what matters most when making judgments about foreign policy — experience and expertise on the one hand, or personal identity on the other. And I find myself coming down on the side of identity," Zakaria wrote in February, suggesting that like Obama he is "truly distinctive about the way I look at the world, about the advantage that I may have over others in understanding foreign affairs..." (the admiration is mutual; Obama was recently seen reading Zakaria’s book, The Post-American World, and some blogs have speculated about a cabinet position for him in an Obama administration).
Such testimonials have to some degree assuaged the doubts of Indian government observers, who for a while foresaw a Hillary Clinton-John McCain face-off in November. It was assumed to be a battle between two familiar rivals who would each bring their known proclivities to US-India relations. Conventional wisdom in Indian circles is that a McCain win will result in a broad continuation of Bush administration policies, including a possible revival of the US-India nuclear deal in the event of a favourable political alignment and atmosphere after the general elections. Beyond that, US-India ties, at least from Washington’s perspective, would continue to be largely security driven, subject to conservative impulses arising from fears of an extremist Islamist agenda to India’s west and an expanding Chinese influence everywhere. A Clinton administration would not be very different, with perhaps a little more emphasis on non-proliferation objectives (although a recent McCain speech suggests he too will go down the same path). "But with Obama, we are still not sure because he is still putting the pieces and players together," admitted one official on background, adding, "One thing we know for certain is that he, or anyone else for that matter, will not be hostile to India."
It is now widely acknowledged both in Washington and New Delhi that the two countries have gone beyond party- or individual-based foreign policy that bespoke closer ties with Democratic administrations and a rough time with Republicans in the old days. Following the tetchy years of the Republican Nixon administration, both Democratic and Republic administrations (Carter, Reagan, Bush Sr, Clinton, Bush Jr in that order) have pretty much stayed on course to improve ties with the occasional spat that both countries can live with, say officials. It won’t be any different under a prospective Obama administration.
In fact, some of the key players in an Obama administration could well be familiar India hands. Hillary Clinton is still a contender for vice-presidential nomination, and should the Obama-Clinton ticket win, she will definitely be a major player. Those mentioned as Obama’s secretary of state include Joseph Biden and John Kerry, both old hands from the Senate with deep interest in the region. McCain too is expected to draw on old hands who will be familiar with the region.
Where New Delhi will also hold its breath (aside from non-proliferation issues) is the approach of the coming US administration to the Islamic world, where the Bush regime is seen to have hit all the wrong buttons. Obama, because of a political vision evolved from a more composite upbringing, has already signalled that he is inclined to engage diplomatically with countries such as Iran, which most "thoroughbred" US politicians treat as an enemy. He was also among the earliest to oppose the war on Iraq and has promised to bring the troops home. Instead, he has indicated that the focus of his war on terror will be Pakistan.
In this area at least, Obama’s impulses are more in tune with New Delhi. Despite his abiding friendship with Pakistanis from his collegiate days, Obama appears to view a military-dominated Pakistan and the fundamentalist monarchy in Saudi Arabia with deep distrust (his Karachi visit happened during the Zia years). McCain, on the other hand, is the author of the long-running Republican coziness with the fundamentalists and militarists in Riyadh and Islamabad respectively, dispensations that India too has reservations about. Indian officials surmise that a McCain administration will be good for India in terms of bilaterals, but could also mean a world fraught with tension. But then, an Obama administration that backs away and hands over any notional victory to Islamists also cannot be good, they add.
In either event, India, as always, will have to tread carefully and tread its own path.
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