When Anuradha Bakshi immigrated to the U.S. in 1971, she would frequently be questioned by American women as to why India had so many prominent female politicians, such as the late Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit, the first female president of the United Nations General Assembly.
âThey would ask me: âHow long will it take to get a woman into the White House? I said 50 years,ââ the Indian American woman recalled to
India-West.
Fifty years later, Bakshi, with her daughter Shikha and grand-daughter Avani, watched her prediction realized, as Vice President Kamala Devi Harris took her oath of office Jan. 20 morning, sworn in by Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor on the grounds of the Capitol Building. The nationâs new vice president breaks several barriers: she is the first Indian American, the first Black person, and the first woman to hold the post.