SAJA Home | Tips | Profiles | Membership | Mailing Lists | SAJA Awards | SAJA Stylebook

SAJA Roundup & Reporting Tips > Bobby Jindal Wins U.S. Congressional Seat

Send URLs & updates to saja@columbia.edu

Last updated Nov. 4 @ 11:35 pm in NYC | Launched: Nov. 2
Compiled by Sreenath Sreenivasan & John Laxmi with input from around the globe

Got a question? Need a source? Ask SAJA: saja@columbia.edu or 212-854-5979
Also: SAJA Source List for U.S. and South Asia stories

Bobby Jindal Becomes First South Asian in Nearly 50 Years to Be Elected to Congress


 

NOV 2, 2004: On election night, Jindal addresses supporters at his victory party. You can see his new baby, Shaan, in the arms of his wife, Supriya, who's just off camera.

Bobby Jindal, 33,  was elected to the House of Representatives from the first district in Louisiana.

He becomes only the second South Asian American to be elected to this level of U.S. government, making him the senior-most elected official of South Asian origin in America.

 In 1956, Dilip Singh Saund was the first Asian American (not just the first Indian American) elected to Congress. READ MORE ABOUT SAUND: PBS documentary | Asian American Action Fund

 

Photo from Jindal press office

 

NEWS ARTICLES

PRE-ELECTION ARTICLES

List of most senior elected South Asian politicians in the US - all are in STATE legislatures; Jindal is the only one in Washington

  • Kumar Barve, state legislator, Maryland
    Majority leader, House of Delegates
  • Upendra Chivukula, assemblyman, New Jersey
  • Satveer Choudhary, state senator, Minnesota
  • Swati Dandekar, state legislator, Iowa (reelected Nov. 2, 2004)
  • Nikky Haley (Nimrata Randhawa), state legislator, North Carolina (elected Nov. 2, 2004)
  • Saghir Tahir,  member of House of Representatives, New Hampshire

THE CAMPAIGN

BIO FACTS
Republican from Louisiana
33 years old

  • Narrowly lost race for Louisiana governor in 2003 (first South Asian to compete at that level).
  • Appointed by President George W. Bush as Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
  • President of the University of Louisiana System
  • Executive Director, National Bipartisan Commission on the Future of Medicare (Breaux-Thomas Commission)
  • Secretary, Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals
  • Consultant for McKinsey & Company

Personal Information

  • Born (1971) and raised in Louisiana
  • Married for 6 years to the former Supriya Jolly
  • Father of Selia Elizabeth (age 2) & Shaan Robert (newborn)

Education 

  • Graduate of Brown University with honors in biology and public policy
  • Graduate Degree from Oxford University as Rhodes Scholar

 


LIVE WEB PANEL: Looking Ahead: What the US Election Results Mean for South Asia and South Asians in America; Thursday at 1 pm Eastern; join us from around the world

SAJA Home | Tips | Profiles | Membership | Mailing Lists | SAJA Awards | SAJA Stylebook