Hindu American Leader Writes On Political Candidates From Dharma Faiths

An op-ed by Aseem Shulka, co-founder of the Hindu American Foundation, published Wednesday by the Washington Post, laments the fact that the two best known Indian-American political figures, both with backgrounds in Dharma faiths, emphasize their Christianity. Governor of Louisiana, Bobby Jindal, who grew up in a Hindu family, converted to Catholicism while in High School. Nikki Haley, winner of the Republican gubernatorial primary in South Carolina this week, who at one time melded her Sikh heritage with her husband's Methodist faith, has increasingly emphasized her evangelical Christian beliefs. Shulka writes:

Jindal and Haley, as brilliant and dynamic trailblazers, have thrown open the doors to political office, laying waste to minefields of ethnic slurs and perverse allegations that naysayers put in their way. Race is not an impediment to high office, and that is something to celebrate, no doubt. But in their public remonstrations of their parent's faiths, Jindal and Haley tell well over three million Hindu and Sikh Americans that their time has not yet come as people of faith. And in their absolute denial of their religious heritage, they deny something far greater: a society that privileges pluralism, that no one religion has the monopoly on Truth, and that Hindus, Sikhs, Muslims, Pagans, agnostics and atheists may invest differently towards the afterlife, but can live in this life with all of the humanity, generosity and yes, frailty of any of those that presume to lead our states or nation today.