ON 20 SEPTEMBER, Princeton University’s Hindu Life Program held a discussion titled “Hindu-Americans and the 2020 Elections.” The virtual debate brought together Murali Balaji, the national co-chair of Hindu Americans for Biden, and Jay Kansara, a community organiser for Hindu Voices for Trump. In an electoral cycle marked by bitter partisan divisions, the event marked an unusually polite exchange between two men on opposite sides of the US political aisle.
The host of the event, Vineet Chander, was aware that political debates in 2020 had the potential to turn ugly. “We were fully prepared to skip this opportunity if we couldn’t ensure that we had the right people at the table,” Chander said, before introducing Balaji and Kansara. “Murali and Jay are friends. They are former colleagues. Interestingly, both of them worked side-by-side in some respects at the Hindu American Foundation.” Chander’s introduction was meant to explain why the two were the right people for a civil conversation, but inadvertently revealed a different truth: that the Hindu American Foundation, an advocacy group that has consistently lobbied in favour of the Sangh Parivar—a network of organisations connected to the Hindu-nationalist Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh—encompassed what were considered mainstream Hindu-American voices in both the Democratic and Republican parties.