Indian Americans contributing to growth of both US and India: Indiaspora founder MR Rangaswami

New Delhi [India], August 14 (ANI): Indian Americans are increasingly contributing to the growth of their country, be it as doctors, educationists, hoteliers, and in all other spheres.

Speaking to ANI, MR Rangaswami, founder of the US-based non-profit diaspora advocacy group Indiaspora, who is in India on a visit, said besides contributing to the US, Indian Americans are also investing in their ancestral land.

“A lot of the NRIs in the US are investing in India. Last year, for example, 25 billion dollars of money came from the US to India and most of this went into buying property, investing in companies, investing in the stock market and so on and so forth,” Rangaswami told ANI.

“We have been successful in the US, we are the highest earning demographic, but we also create a lot of jobs. We are doctors, we service a lot of patients, we are professors, we teach a lot of students. So these are the kinds of things we are trying to highlight,” he said.

The diaspora advocacy recently put out a report highlighting the impact of the Indian diaspora in the US. Among key findings in the report, it revealed that 60 per cent of the hotels in the US are owned by Indians. “They are doing a service because many of them are in small towns where big corporations may not want to set up a hotel.”

Another notable finding was that Indian Americans are serving in small cities and tier-three cities in the US and very small towns helping rural communities.

“In fact, there is one doctor who delivered 8,000 babies in a small town in Pennsylvania. So, these are the kinds of things that were startling,” Rangaswami said.

Also, explaining the global acceptability of yoga, he said there are about 36,000 yoga studios in the US. This, he said, validates the value of yoga.

Asked about the trade outlook between the two partner countries, he said the trade is bidirectional. “India is putting billions into the US. The US is putting billions into a very virtuous cycle, so I think it’s happening on both sides.”

There are about 30 million diaspora members who live outside of India. Of those, 5.1 million live in the US.

“They are giving a lot of money to charities. They’re also investing in India. So that is the strength of the US is it’s the largest diaspora,” he said.

About today’s India, he said in the last ten years, the country has seen dramatic progress in infrastructure in so many aspects of the economy.

“We feel proud when we come back to India and see the airport and roads, highways here in Delhi. I mean, we are so proud to see that these are world-class infrastructure projects that have developed and so I think there’s a lot of pride also the ease of business is better in India now.”

Asked how he looks at India under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s leadership, he said, “I still see the drive and energy after ten years of governing a country. You know, he still has the energy and the passion and the vision to drive this. So I think he’s still on the track to make India better and better. I think the growth is still there in India compared to all the other economies. So I think it’s a very bright future.”

He met the Prime Minister three or four times so far. Last time they met at the state dinner hosted for Modi by President Biden.

On diaspora and the impact on the US election, he said the diaspora members are all excited.

“We are all excited that we have an Indian American running for president in Kamala Harris. There’s a lot of excitement within the community about that,” he concluded.