On Tuesday night, at eighteen minutes past eleven, Zohran Mamdani walked out onto the stage at New York City's Brooklyn Paramount Theater after a historic win in a mayoral election that had made headlines around the world.
He had defeated former governor Andrew Cuomo, his billionaire backers, and pro-Israel groups that had tried to label him as "antisemitic". He had also beaten another set of opponents that largely escaped the attention of the American media—the Hindu right in New York.
For months, the Hindu right had waged a campaign, labelling Mamdani as “Hinduphobic” and “anti-Hindu”, in the hopes of defeating the Muslim democratic socialist.
The Foreign Campaigner
On the evening of 16 July, for instance, there had been a surprise campaigner in the New York City mayoral election. One who had flown all the way from India to be there.
Kajal Shingala aka Kajal Hindustani, the far-right activist who was arrested in 2023 over a hate speech that was said to have triggered communal violence in Gujarat's Una, had made her way to New York as part of a US tour. In front of an audience brought together by the Gujarati Samaj of New York and a host of other Indian American and Hindu American groups, Shingala had launched an attack against the Muslim candidate in the running for mayor—Zohran Mamdani.
Shingala referred to Mamdani, then the Democratic nominee for New York City mayor, as a "jihadi zombie"—and likened him to a monster.
“Till the time there are monsters alive in the world, Ram Rajya cannot be created… Today, monsters named Babar, Aurangzeb, Abdul, Aftab, who are brain dead jihadi zombies roam around among us,” she said. “A monster has emerged here too, among you. His name is Zohran Mamdani, the jihadi zombie.”
Shingala’s comments were part of a larger narrative that the Hindu right in New York had attempted to build up against Mamdani. Over the course of the election cycle, there were repeated attempts made, and thousands of dollars spent, in trying to label Mamdani as “Hinduphobic” and “anti-Hindu”.
Those efforts had then been amplified by candidates opposing Mamdani as well, including Cuomo and current mayor Eric Adams. On 22 October, in the final mayoral election debate, Cuomo said Mamdani had been “a divisive force in New York” for the Hindus. And Adams, while he was still in the race, had also shared posts calling Mamdani “anti-Hindu.”
The Strategy Against Mamdani
The campaign to make Mamdani appear “anti-Hindu” included instances of outright disinformation. For example, a picture clicked of Mamdani outside a Hindu temple was shared with the claim that he was disrespecting Hindus by entering a temple with his shoes on. The allegation was disproven by eyewitnesses who provided photos to show that Mamdani had taken his shoes off before actually entering the temple.
In a radio interview on 13 June that was listed as part of campaign finance disclosures by Indian Americans for Cuomo, a member of the group said they felt Mamdani was “making statements very derogatory towards our dharma, Hindu dharma”.
The host then added, “He [Mamdani] made some inappropriate comments towards Prime Minister Narendra Modi and India.”
But how did Mamdani’s criticism of PM Modi make him “anti-Hindu”? That was left unexplained. It is a matter of fact that Mamdani has been critical of the PM.
In a 2023 event in New York City titled ‘Howdy Democracy?!’—a play on the 2019 ‘Howdy Modi’ event attended by Donald Trump and PM Modi in Texas—Mamdani had read out a letter by Umar Khalid, a pro-democracy activist in India who has languished behind bars now for close to five years without trial.
Mamdani read out Khalid’s words, “Hate can never triumph over love forever,” adding that they had resonated with him deeply. At another protest in New York, Mamdani had said,
“We fight for an India that is in line with the one that we knew, an India that is pluralistic, an India where everyone can belong, regardless of their religion.”
In a mayoral forum during this election cycle, Mamdani had also criticised PM Modi over the 2002 Gujarat riots, and said he would not attend a joint press conference with the Indian PM in New York if such an opportunity was presented to him.
On 22 June, two days before polls closed in the mayoral primary, Indian Americans for Cuomo flew an aerial banner across the skies of New York City, accompanied by a press release referring to Mamdani as a politician who promotes division and alienates Hindu New Yorkers.
Several New Yorkers have countered that Mamdani criticising PM Modi does not equate to him being “anti-Hindu”. Rita Soni, an Indian American based in Brooklyn, said,
“If that were the case, then millions of Indians in India would be considered Hinduphobic.”
The Counter Campaign
In the hopes of countering such claims, New Yorkers like Soni formed the group—Hindus For Zohran. They created a social media presence, canvassed for the Mamdani campaign, and addressed the allegations of Hinduphobia directly with Hindu voters who seemed unsure of voting for Mamdani.
On Saturday morning, three days before polls closed, the group organised a prayer meet in front of the Hare Krishna Tree in New York’s Tompkins Square Park. The tree is named after ISKCON founder AC Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada and his disciples who gathered in the park in the fall of 1966 and chanted the 16-word mantra: "Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare; Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare."
Under that same tree, Hindus For Zohran expressed their solidarity with Mamdani. Several members of the group, along with various faith leaders, spoke at the event, which also included a recital of the Hanuman Chalisa by Soni.
“We organised a prayer gathering because we wanted to envelop him with love and protective blessings in the face of such hate and bigotry,” said Sunita Viswanath, one of the founders of Hindus For Zohran.
The event was attended by Mamdani’s mother, Indian American filmmaker Mira Nair, who shared an anecdote about Zohran’s childhood. “He played Ram in his nursery school,” Nair told the gathering.
On the eve of election day, Hindus For Zohran also released a series of testimonials on social media from Hindu New Yorkers who voiced support for the Democratic nominee. Mamdani himself reached out to the Hindu community in New York during his campaign trail.
During a visit to the BAPS Swaminarayan Mandir, where he spoke to priests and devotees, Mamdani said, “My mother’s family taught me about Raksha Bandhan, taught me about Holi, taught me about Diwali. To be here with you is so special to me because when I meet the members of this mandir, I hear the names of my own family.”
After visiting the BAPS temple and a Ganesh temple in Queens, he told reporters, “I am proud I would be the first Indian American mayor of this city, and I am proud that my mother’s family is Hindu.”
A Footnote of History
On election night, history was made in New York City on many counts.
Mamdani is going to be the first Muslim mayor of the 400-year-old city, the first South Asian mayor, and an immigrant mayor after ages as well.
The voter turnout went up from 1.1 million in 2021 to over 2 million this time, crossing that mark for the first time in over half a century.
Mamdani's campaign had included a whopping 104,000 volunteers who had knocked on 3 million doors and led over 5,700 canvases, making this arguably the largest ever grassroots campaign for mayor in the US.
And Mamdani had beaten the big bucks spent by the billionaire class who had attempted to disparage and discredit him. Just days before polls closed, outside spending (independent of the campaigns themselves) backing Cuomo was more than seven times the amount put behind Mamdani. The former exceeded the assemblymember by a staggering $36 million in outside support.
So yes, history was made on a lot of fronts. As a footnote to that history will be the role played by the Hindu right in New York, attempting to malign Mamdani.
Mamdani's message that he is not "anti-Hindu" was made repeatedly on the campaign trail, and on the night of his win too, with the victory rally making numerous nods to his Indian heritage.
Lines immortalised by India's first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru as India made a tryst with destiny on 15 August 1947 were repeated by Mamdani in his victory speech—“A moment comes but rarely in history. When we step out from the old to the new. When an age ends and when the soul of a nation long suppressed finds utterance.”
Mamdani added, “Tonight, we have stepped out from the old into the new.” At the end of his speech, as his family came out to greet him, his mother Mira Nair walked on stage in a blue sari, hands folded in a ‘Namaste’, before hugging him.
And finally, when the next mayor of New York City and his family stood in front of the crowd of supporters greeting them with rapturous applause, the song that rang through the venue took Bollywood fans present there, like myself, and those watching the event live around the world, by complete surprise.
‘Dhoom Machale’? There’s no doubt that Zohran Mamdani has done so this election.