By GAUTHAM NAGESH, Nextgov
Following reports that surfaced last week, a White House spokesman has confirmed to Nextgov that Google executive Sonal Shah will be joining the Obama administration as director of the Office of Social Innovation and Civic Participation.
Formerly the head of Google's philanthropic arm, Shah is slated to lead the office, which is expected to work with nonprofits and community organizations to encourage "social entrepreneurship." The administration has thus far avoided releasing any details about the mission or structure of the office. Shah also served as a member of Obama's transition team, helping to develop technology policy.
The news of Shah's appointment has been greeted favorably in some circles, particularly among the philanthropic community.
However, her involvement with the White House has been controversial due to her ties to the right-wing Vishwa Hindu Parishad, which is accused of using charitable works in India as a cover for inciting communal hatred. The VHP has been condemned by the State Department and the nonprofit Human Rights Watch for its role in the 2002 mob violence in Gujurat, which resulted in the deaths of 1,000 people, most of whom were Muslims.
By GAUTHAM NAGESH, Government Executive
Obama transition team member Sonal Shah's involvement with a controversial Hindu group was greater than she indicated in a recent statement, according to members of the organization.
A series of e-mails obtained by Nextgov suggest that Shah was an active member of the Vishva Hindu Parishad of America during the late 1990s and contributed to strategic discussions regarding the group's public image. Two VHP of America officials also confirmed that Shah served on the organization's governing council in the 1990s.
VHP is an international Hindu organization that is part of Sangh Parivar, the Indian nationalist movement organized around Hindutva, or Hindu nationalism. VHP has been condemned by the nonprofit group Human Rights Watch and the State Department for its role in the 2002 violence in the northwestern state of Gujarat that killed more than 1,000 people, most of them Muslims.
Shah, an executive with Google who previously worked for the Treasury Department and Goldman Sachs, was appointed to President-elect Barack Obama's transition team in November and later named to be part of a three-person team to write technology policy.
In a recent statement sent to National Journal, Shah called the allegations "attacks" and said her association with the VHP of America involved work on earthquake relief in 2001. She added that if she could have anticipated the group's silence "in the face of its Indian counterpart's complicity in the events of Gujarat in 2002" she "would have not associated with the VHP of America."
But in e-mail messages sent to the VHP of America's listserv in May 1998, Shah participated in discussions regarding the group's public image. At one point she made reference to the Indian branch of the VHP, or VHP Bharat, as a model: "Why don't we focus on improving the lives of its citizens, etc. That's where VHP Bharat's strength is -- people remember that." The e-mails also refer to a "long talk" between Shah and VHP of America official Vijay Pallod, in which Pallod called Shah part of the organization's "new generation." Shah did not respond to requests for comment at the time this article was posted.
VHP of India first rose to international prominence in December 1992 by leading the demolition of the Babri mosque in Ayodhya. The incident sparked riots and communal violence throughout the country.
Shah has been under fire since she was first named to Obama's transition team, but questions about her ties to the VHP of America surfaced much earlier. Trinity College professor Vijay Prashad, who wrote an article on the Web site CounterPunch questioning her appointment to the transition team, first asked Shah about her links to Sangh groups in 2004. Prashad said Shah's reaction to the questions both then and now have been dismissive.
"On the merits of the story she tells about her own involvement, there are certainly unanswered questions," said Prashad. "The questions are about the depth of her involvement and they speak not to any kind of anti-Muslim feelings but a lack of judgment. These statements strike me as opportunistic."
Despite Shah's statement renouncing the VHP, the issue has remained a hot topic in the Indian press. On Dec. 5, a group of more than 60 U.S. academics, many working in South Asian-related fields, sent a letter to Obama expressing their concern over Shah's appointment and the increasing influence of Hindu nationalism in America.
Prashad also pointed to a 2004 speech by Shah at a Sangh-related event, where according to the organization's Web site, Shah "exposed the hypocrisy of the Western way of life, highlighting its wasteful ways and compared them to the simpler but more genuine life in India. She mentioned how Indians would sacrifice whatever they had for their guests, but we in the West cannot even sacrifice a little time for them."
Shah's brother, Anand Shah, said during an interview earlier in December that as children growing up in Houston, he and his sister had limited knowledge of Indian politics and did not understand the entire context surrounding the VHP. He said they viewed the VHP as an "innocuous organization" and that it is "very different now."
"The choices we made were the best choices we could at the time. Had I known all the things I know now, there's a whole lot of things I wouldn't have done," said Anand Shah. He added that his sister speaks at numerous conferences to promote her nonprofit Indicorps, which arranges for American students to volunteer in India.
Prashad expressed skepticism at the Shah family's claims of ignorance regarding the VHP because Shah's father, Ramesh Shah, is known as a leader of the American wing of several Sangh Parivar organizations. Prashad also noted Sonal Shah's involvement in the VHP was well after the events of Ayodhya, which attracted international scrutiny.
"She is a smart person," said Prashad, referencing Shah's time at Treasury working on the Asian financial crisis. "Given all that, I find it unbelievable that these things are a surprise. She was on the governing council of the VHP-A while in the Treasury Department. It just doesn't sound credible."
The VHP of America issued a statement denying any role in the Gujarat violence and said it was independent of the eponymous Indian organization. But a spokesman said the two groups share similar goals and noted the VHP-A's Web site, listed as one of its goals to "establish VHP as the voice of Hindus everywhere and represent Hindu organizations and institutions on matters of Hindu interests."
By GAUTHAM NAGESH, Government Executive
After weeks of questions, Obama transition team member and former Google executive Sonal Shah today renounced her former connection to a Hindu organization accused of fomenting violence against Muslims and Christians in India.
In a statement obtained exclusively by NextGov and National Journal, Shah says that if she could have anticipated the role of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) in the 2002 outbreak of communal violence in the Indian state of Gujarat, she never would have associated with the group's American branch a year earlier:
In 2002, Gujarat suffered one of the most profound tragedies in its long history, when extremist political leaders, including some associated with the VHP, incited riots that resulted in the deaths of thousands. Had I been able to foresee the role of the VHP in India in these heinous events, or anticipate that the VHP of America could possibly stand by silently in the face of its Indian counterpart's complicity in the events of Gujarat in 2002 -- thereby undermining the American group's cultural and humanitarian efforts with which I was involved -- I would not have associated with the VHP of America.
The controversy escalated this weekend when Shah asked supporters for their help in stopping the spread of allegations that she had been a member of the VHP.
In an e-mail sent Friday night and obtained by NextGov, Shah asked her supporters for help combating the allegations and expressed fear that the Obama transition team would ask her to resign as a result of the story.
"I need your help," wrote Shah. "This is gaining legs as the National Journal also picked it up and likely Fox. I need to moblize [sic] people against the leftists and the right wing. There is a likely chance that they will ask me to resign as team does not need my publicity."
The controversy has been gathering steam in the Indian press and South Asian blogosphere for weeks now, but it went mainstream on Thursday when former GOP Senator Rick Santorum published an op-ed in the Philadelphia Inquirer questioning the appointment of Shah to the transition team -- prompting a Lost In Transition post Friday.
Continue reading Under Pressure, Shah Renounces Hindu Group.
By DERON LEE
Former Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, a conservative Republican, has joined a diverse chorus of voices protesting Barack Obama's selection last month of Indian-American economist Sonal Shah, a Google executive, to his transition team.
Santorum's Thursday op-ed piece for the Philadelphia Inquirer repeated the charge made by several others: that Shah's past charitable work with the American wing of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad -- an Indian organization that has been accused of fomenting violence against Christians and Muslims -- sends a discomfiting message to the world about the new administration's attitude toward the region.
"Shah should condemn the VHP and its actions soon," Santorum wrote. "If she doesn't, keeping her on -- or, more ominously, giving her a post in the new administration -- would send the message that the president-elect does not think the VHP is a radical organization."
Trinity College (Conn.) professor Vijay Prashad -- no ideological ally of Santorum's -- has written a set of articles critical of Shah in the liberal newsletter Counterpunch. A coalition of Indian-American groups has demanded that Shah repudiate the VHP and its sister organization, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. And the media in both India and Pakistan have covered the controversy closely.
