Indian American community comes out in support of Garcia

Garcia with a group of supporters
Garcia with a group of supporters

CHICAGO: Mayoral candidate Jesus “Chuy” Garcia looks forward for the development of City of Chicago by embracing all diverse immigrant communities who adopted it. “Let us make Chicago a global city by embracing all people of this city”, he said.

Garcia was addressing a large gathering of Indian and Pakistani Americans who joined for a fundraiser call from veteran Indian community leader Iftekhar Shareef.

The event was held at Holiday Inn O’Hare Airport on March 28. Young Azhar Shareef, son of Iftekhar Shareef and Kareem Lakhani, emceed the event. Chuy Garcia hailed the young supporters and remarked they looked like his own sons campaigning for him.

In his brief address, Chuy Garcia thanked the Indian American community for showing such incredible solidarity of support for his candidacy and assured the leaders that his administration will form a robust representation of Indian Americans, both in the city and in the sister-agencies.
Garcia pledged that his administration will reflect the rainbow coalition of all communities coming together to make the city a vibrant city of great standing.

He recalled how he landed in the city of Chicago in 1965 as a 9 year old kid and adopted it. The city has embraced diverse immigrants from many countries and developed by contribution from all immigrants. Garcia liked to include all communities for the city development projects. He also looked forward to making Chicago a port city, connecting it through waters to Michigan and beyond.
Garcia is confident that Chicago communities will elect him for a change. “For a mayor who listens to people than a mayor who listens to big houses.”

Iftekhar Shareef thanked all for joining the event and called for support to Chuy Garcia. Shareef also introduced important Indian and Pakistani community members to Chuy Garcia. He announced that presence of senior members of Federation of Indian Associations (FIA) Chicago automatically endorsed Chuy Garcia from the Indian community.

Shareef also announced support for Garcia from other organizations, namely American Telugu Association (ATA) represented by Hanumanth Reddy and American Muslim Task Force(AMTF) represented by Sher Muhammed Rajput and Muhammed Salik Akhtar and many Chicago students, Indo American Democratic Organization [IADO] with its president Ram Villivallam.
Among many other senior Chicago community members present were Keerthi Kumar Ravoori, Kanti Patel, Dr Mehboob Kapadia, Balvinder Singh, Mansoor Lakhani, Dr Jaychand Pallekonda, Harish Kolasani and Babubhai Patel.

A.Q. Siddiqui
India Post News Service