Much of the anti-India rhetoric at Frisco City Council meetings in Texas was manufactured from social media, Sahas Kaul and Neha Suratran said.
After their speeches at Frisco City Council meetings echoing the “Indian takeover” narrative went viral, Indian Americans Sahas Kaul and Neha Suratran spoke in a recent podcast about what motivated them to take a stand for their community.
While Cowell said the attack against India appears suspiciously coordinated, Suratran said influential activists come to Frisco and speak at these city council meetings just for their social media.Over the past few months, city council meetings in Frisco, Texas, have been in the news due to anti-Indian rhetoric that originated there and spread across social media. Cole and Soratran chose to confront those narratives and spoke out at the meetings.Cole said these people target H-1B holders because they know H-1B holders will not protest, as they have to protect their jobs and status in the United States. But as an American citizen, Cowell is unafraid, which is why he chose to attend these meetings and stand up for the Indian-American community. He also said that after attending the first meeting, he discovered that it was just a handful of people, gathered together in these meetings, who were spreading anti-India hate – and not a large section of people as it might seem on social media.
Suratran said the “Indian takeover” claim conveniently ignores the fact that technology companies are also coming to Texas and that Indians are contributing to the growth. She said city councils are not responsible for immigration at all, but these activism influencers pick these city council meetings just for X or Instagram so it looks like they are speaking to power and can make real change.On the one hand, these people say that Indians are not assimilating into American culture, and on the other hand, they claim that there are only students of Indian origin in the Boy Scouts, Suratran said. Indian Americans are paying for Medicare and Social Security while not benefiting from either, Suratran said, adding that there should be a discussion about H-1B fraud and abuse, but that should not be mixed with anti-Indian perception.
