60,000, Including Lankans, Vie For Seats At PMs NYC Event Moteliers across America --from sand swept Utah to lonely Montana -are making plans to head to the Big Apple in September. But its not just the Gujarati Patels who will be getting down at Penn station to attend the Narendra Modi event in New York on September 28, but Tamils too. Many of them young IT professionals, members of the Tamil diaspora in the US, are excited to hear Modi speak at the Madison Square Garden. For the moteliers it would be a personal triumph as the US denied a visa to Mo di when they invited him last time. For the Tamils, however, it would be a chance to hear from the new Prime Minister. “I subscribe to the Dravidian ideology but I wish to know his views on Indian-American issues,“ said K Sivakumar, former president of Washington Tamil Sangam, over phone. Indian-American Community Foundation, set up recently to organize the event, has received some 60,000 applications from people across the US. The auditorium can only accommodate 35,000 people. Though Gujaratis have applied to attend in huge numbers, Tamils are not too far behind, organizers say .Who gets to attend, however, would be decided by a lottery system. “Seventy percent of the participants would be less than 40 years old,“ an organizer told TOI. Sathish Rajendran, an IT professional in Philadelphia, is eagerly waiting to know the lottery results. “I have got a confirmation mail from the organizers. I think we got a strong leader as PM now and I wish to listen to him speak,“ he said and added that many of his colleagues and friends have also registered for the event. A 15-member working committee has been constituted, many of them Gujaratis. “We have been instructed to have minorities in the working committee. So we have two Muslims, two Christians and one Sikh. American Tamil Sangam president Prakash M Swamy is the only committee member from south India,“ said an organizer. More than 20 Tamil associations have registered for the meeting. K Muthumani, former president of the Tamil Association of Greater Delaware Valley , said he has been getting many requests from young IT professionals. “Sri Lankan Tamils have also registered in significant numbers,“ a senior member of the California Tamil Sangam said.
Posted on: Thu, 11 Sep 2014 08:22:59 +0000
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