Aruna Miller, the new Democratic lieutenant governor of Maryland, is raising concerns in the state about her decades-long ties to supporters of far-right Hindu nationalist groups.
Miller, a former state lawmaker, took office last month alongside Gov. Wes Moore (D). Since then, activists and voters have sounded the alarm over Miller’s history of shunning nationalist groups and avoiding questions about his ties to a violent ideology that has long repressed minorities. She and Moore also fielded questions about collecting thousands of dollars in political donations from people sympathetic to Hindutva, a far-right nationalist ideology that mirrors white supremacy.
The Moore-Miller campaign website said “there is not one dollar in this campaign that has anything to do with the Hindutva movement or international politics.” But activists and voters told HuffPost they are concerned that Miller’s political career appears to have benefited from donors and other supporters with close ties to far-right Hindu nationalist groups. Miller’s ability to win his race and enter public office, they said, signals an ominous trend of questionable dedication in Democratic races and the potentially dangerous impact on marginalized communities across the United States.
“It’s bigger than [Miller]. It’s an example of the invasion of the Democratic Party by a fascist entity,” said Susan Kerin, chapter president of Peace Action Montgomery, the local chapter of the human rights advocacy group Peace Action. “[Miller’s case] it’s a little more blatant, but it’s really something we need to be aware of.
A spokesperson for the Moore-Miller campaign told HuffPost that Miller “consistently and unequivocally condemns all forms of religious persecution and violence and all the hateful ideologies that perpetuate it” and noted that she won her race with a majority people. votes in the history of lieutenant governor of Maryland.
“While it is unfortunate that some have continued to mischaracterize Aruna’s remarks, she will continue to be a leader in protecting all of Maryland from all forms of religious persecution and violence,” the spokesperson added.
Originally inspired by European ethno-nationalism over 100 years ago, far-right Hindu nationalism supports Hindu supremacy through violent extremist and political means. Proponents of Hindutva – which is not the Hindu faith – have long targeted members of other religious groups, including Muslims, Christians and Sikhs.
Over the past two decades, ideology has increasingly infiltrated global politics.
In 2005, Hindu nationalist Narendra Modi was barred from entering the United States for his role in 2002 anti-Muslim riots that killed almost 2,000 people.
But after being elected Prime Minister of India in 2014, Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party – a Hindu nationalist political party who consider the country practically a Hindu state, managed to circumvent this ban and allow entry into the United States
Support for Modi’s government remains strong, and not just in India. Nearly half of Indian Americans approve of his performance as prime minister, with a third of respondents favoring the BJP government, according to a study 2020 from the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
Miller’s support for Modi and the BJP dates back nearly a decade.
In 2014, as Modi gathered support ahead of the election, Miller attended an event in Virginia hosted by Overseas Friends of the BJP (OFBJP), the international wing of the BJP. Sudhir Sekhsaria, an allergist from Maryland, was one of the guests at the event. According to him, Sekhsaria has donated to Miller’s campaigns since 2011 public records.
Miller, a Maryland state delegate at the time, commented that he was looking forward to seeing Modi in New York after he won the election.
“The last time I went to Madison Square Garden in New York, I think I saw a rock show. Now there will be a new rock star there on September 28, PM Modi,” he said She said in an interview with The American Bazaar, an Indian-American news publication.
“While some create transformation through music, PM Modi and his team will create transformation through their leadership and a new vision, not only for India, but also through the relationship they will have with the United States,” he added.
Miller has since tried to distance himself from the BJP, tweet in March 2022, who attended Modi’s 2014 event “before any authoritarian action taken as Prime Minister”.
“I have supported the rights of Muslims in Maryland and abroad throughout my career and that will continue,” he said.
But activists say the tweet was fake because Modi was involved in Hindu nationalism before the 2014 event. They point out that Miller continued to receive support from figures with close ties to Modi and the Hindutva movement.
When he launched his race for Maryland’s 6th Congressional District in 2018, Miller hired Sekhsaria as his treasurer. Sekhsaria hosted a fundraiser for Miller in Houston, attended by several Hindu nationalists. Among them was Ramesh Bhutada, the former vice president of the Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh USA, the American arm of a Hindu nationalist volunteer paramilitary organization in India called the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, or RSS. BJP is the political arm of RSS.
Members of the Bhutada family, including Ramesh, had it traveled to India to help Modi’s 2014 election and were among them administrator from 2019 Ciao Modi Event. in Texas, where more than 50,000 people gathered to watch the prime minister speak.
Miller’s run for the US Congress was unsuccessful.
He later joined Moore government ticket in December 2021. Along with leaders of two organizations that once supported former President Donald Trump, Sekhsaria co-hosted a fundraiser for the Moore-Miller campaign in September 2022. She also donated at least 14,000 dollars in 2022 alone, according to campaign finance records. .
One of the participants in the September event was Drink prasad, the national president of OFBJP. The organization registered as a foreign agent in 2022 due to a federal requirement individuals or groups that engage in political activity on behalf of a foreign country publicly disclose their activities and finances to combat foreign influence in the United States
Scott Webber, a Democratic activist from Maryland, told HuffPost that he supported Miller’s platform as a state delegate until he learned of his ties to far-right Hindu groups.
“It’s not against immigrants. Talk about being pro-women. You talk about religious pluralism. It speaks to tolerance and the need to have an open dialogue and to be against violence,” Webber said. “He talks about all these things but supports the BJP.”
“It is an absolutely incongruous position to take as someone who reaches positions of power. It’s one of those “Don’t just listen to what I say, pay attention to what I do,” he added.
Webber now joins a coalition of activists and voters who are increasingly concerned about the influence of Hindutva and are calling on Miller to unequivocally and publicly denounce the movement. They also want Miller to return donations he received from people with Hindutva connections and redirect those funds to human rights groups.
And they fear that the Democratic Party may accept more and more candidates who receive the support of extremists. Former representative Tulli Gabbarda former Democrat who is now an independent, AND Sri Preston Kulkarni, a Democratic congressional candidate from Texas, they have also faced scrutiny for having donors with Hindutva ties and courting members of right-wing Hindu groups.
“It’s a racist move. It is a chaste move. It is a movement of supremacy. It is an anti-Semitic movement. It is an Islamophobic movement. All of these things will affect people who are already vulnerable and marginalized in the United States,” said Peace Action Montgomery member Gayatri Girirajan. “We should start looking at the Hindutva movement as some kind of really powerful, slow, long-term foreign interference that really has a tangible impact.”
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