Cover Story: Indians Shine World Over

Sonal R Shah (May 20, 1968)

US President Barack Hussain Obama carries a key chain with an idol of 4 armed Hanuman. He appointed Sonal R. Shah (born May 20, 1968), an American economist and public official, as the Director of the Office of Social Innovation and Civic Participation in the White House from April 2009 to August 2011. Shah is the founding executive director of the Beeck Center for Social Impact and Innovation at Georgetown University. Previously, Shah was the head of Global Development Initiatives, a philanthropic arm of Google.org.
Neel Kashkari (July 30, 1973)

When USA faced severe trillion dollar financial crisis, President George Bush in Oct 2008 appointed Neel Kashkari, a Kashmiri Pandit as the head of the new office of Financial Stability. Obama’s team in 2009 asked Kashkari to remain at Treasury for some more period and assist in the transition. Several Indians are now walking the corridors of power in Washington DC.
Lisa Sthalekar (1979)

Lisa Sthalekar (born in Pune in 1979) is a former female Australian international cricketer. She was rated as the leading all rounder in the world when rankings were introduced. She is the first and the only (till 2013) International woman cricketer to score 1,000 runs and take 100 wickets in ODIs.

Eric Pearce (Oct 29, 1931)

Eric Pearce (Born in Jabalpur in 1931) an Anglo Indian is one of the finest hockey players to have represented Australia. He represented Australia in 4 Olympics (1956 – 1968). All his four brothers (total 5 in the family) were International Hockey players for Australia. He and his brother Julian Pearce have been inducted into Sport Australia Hall of Fame. Bakhtawar (Buck) Singh Samrai is a Sikh wrestler who represented Australia in the wrestling heavyweight class at the Tokyo Olympic Games in 1964.

Vikash Dhorasoo

Vikash Dhorasoo a French national of Indian and Mauritius origin was part of the French National Football team for the 2006 World Cup. He is the first Indian to play in the world cup. Though he has not been to the country of his forefathers, the French national team player is very clear about his love for Bharat. “I will come to India with the idea of helping the sport grow in the country.”

Mohini Bhardwaj (1978)

Mohini Bhardwaj (born 1978) is a retired American gymnast who competed at the 1997 and 2001 World Championships and earned a team silver medal at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens. She is the first Indian-American gymnast, and the second Indian-American athlete overall ever to win medal at the Olympics.

Sanjay Raj Bhavsar (1980)

Sanjay Raj Bhavsar (born 1980) is an American artistic gymnast. He earned a bronze medal as a member of the 2008 U.S. Olympic Team, becoming the third Indian-American ever to medal at the Olympics, after Mohini Bhardwaj and Alexi Grewal. He was originally an alternate, but was named to the team following the injury withdrawal of Paul Hamm.

Alexi Singh Grewal

Alexi Singh Grewal (born 1960 in Aspen, Colorado) is an Indian-American Olympic gold medallist and former professional road racing cyclist. At the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, Grewal became the first American man to win an Olympic gold medal in road cycling. He has two brothers, Rishi and Ranjeet, who are top American cyclists, especially in mountain bike racing.

Some Other Sports Person

Rohan Kanhai and Alvin Kallicharran were captains of West Indies cricket teams that also boasted of several Indian origin players like Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Daren Ganga, Mahendra Nagamootoo, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Sonny Ramadhin, Denesh Ramdin, Ravi Rampaul and Sunil Narine. One of the finest Indian origin cricketers is Hashim Amla who plays for South Africa.

Shouryya Ray

A 16-year teenager Shouryya Ray from Germany has solved the Newton’s 350 years old, unsolved puzzle which had baffled the world of mathematicians for more than 350 years. He has been now hailed a genius. The schoolboy, from Dresden, Germany, solved two fundamental particle dynamics theories which physicists have previously been able to calculate only by using powerful computers. His solutions mean that scientists can now calculate the flight path of a thrown ball and then predict how it will hit and bounce off a wall.

Akshay Venkatesh

At 12 years of age, Akshay Venkatesh born in Australia became the only Australian to have won medals at both the International Physics Olympiad and International Mathematics Olympiad. Now he is a mathematician and a professor at the Stanford University, USA. His research interests are in the fields of counting, equi-distribution problems in automorphic forms and number theory, in particular representation theory, locally symmetric spaces and ergodic theory.

Heads of States

Many Indian origin persons have been heads of states and have lead their countries in exemplary manners. Cheddi Jagan and Bharat Jagdeo of Guyana, Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam and Sir Aneerood Jugnauth of Mauritius, Dr Anand Satyanand of New Zealand, Devan Nair and S.R.Nathan of Singapore were presidents of their respective countries. R. Sardjoe was Vice-President of the Republic of Suriname. Basdeo Panday and Smt. Kamla Persaud Bissesar of Trinidad, Mahendra Chaudhary of Fiji and Dr. Navinchandra Ramgoolam of Mauritius were Prime Ministers. In other countries like Canada, Jamaica, Malawi, Malaysia, Mozambique and South Africa Indians have served their countries in the capacity of ministers.

Dalip Singh Saund (1899 –1973) was a member of the United States House of Representatives. He served the 29th District of California from January 3, 1957 to January 3, 1963, getting elected thrice. He was the first Asian American/Indian American elected as a voting member of the United States Congress.

Lisa Singh (born 1972) is an Australian politician who is a Labor Party member of the Australian Senate for Tasmania. The grand-daughter of an Indo-Fijian member of the Parliament of Fiji, Singh is Australia's first federal parliamentarian of Indian ancestry. In her maiden speech in the Senate, she claimed descent from the Rajputs.

Kamala Gopie, born in Jamaica to parents whose ancestors went to Jamaica from India as indentured labourers, is a Canadian political activist. She is best known for her community activism within Toronto. Gopie has received several awards for her community activism, most notably the Order of Ontario in 1996.

Pravasi Bharatiyas—Samman evam Sawaal

We can’t claim that 'brain drain' has caused a 'knowledge gap' in India.If that were the case then India’s Mars Mission would not have succeeded at the scale it did!! Many Strategic objectives of the Union of India were achieved at a fraction of the overall cost it takes to produce a single airworthy frame!
When the question of Pravasi Bharatiyas comes, their migration has always been called a brain drain. In fact, brain drain itself is an ancient and natural phenomenon. It is essentially a migration of talent from a surplus state or a deficient state. My forefathers migrated hundreds of years ago from Buravalli (near the present Andhra-Orissa border) to Hebbani (present Rayalseema-Karnataka border) and then my parents constantly oscillated between Hyderabad, Tirupathi, Gujarat and Karnataka due to their transferrable jobs. And, now I am in Texas running a global business after having moved all over India and within the US.
To be blunt- Engineers, Entrepreneurs and Scientists are as successful outside India as they are inside India. It’s just that Pravasi Bharatiyas are more visible and their success more acceptable within India because of the prevailing impression that “Pravasi Bharatiyas” have somehow become experts in areas that foreigners invented in the first place.
However, it is also a fact that Modern Science and Technology have been nurtured and standardised templates for research have been developed by Western Academic Institutions over the past hundred years. But that doesn’t give any exclusivity to Western intellectuals or principals to claim all the credit for everything that exists on earth today. Good news is that Western Science and Western Religion are constantly at odds with one another which fortunately is not the case within Indian thought.
All said and done, there is still a mad rush to study outside of India and seek opportunities that will give a quicker return on theirs or their parent’s investment.
Three things the current Indian Government needs to Concentrate to retain talent

1. Create several Research Universities (RU’s) in the PPP mode with faculty that is well experienced in both Industry and Academia. Also, ensure that State or Central Government becomes the first and foremost customer for any product or service that comes out of the RU’s stable. For any start up the biggest problem is getting that first customer.
2. Encourage Failure. The biggest fear for any risk taker is not failure but a society that discourages the second plunge. Indian society is no different- Success is always multi-fathered and a failure or risk taker is looked down upon.
3. Leverage the existing lack of automation that pervades the Indian society at large. Issue RFP’s for every single government department that will focus exclusively on new products that can be paired with products that already exists in the market.In other words, piggybacking on an existing project management system with an out of the box solution created by a small Indian shop has a ripple effect.
4. DONOT have an IAS officer monitor a Research Project or a University. An Administrator is good at Resource Management not marketing and most certainly not Research.
5. Encourage and legislate Crowd funding to the hilt.

-Pramod Kumar Buravalli