43rd Annual India Day Parade Amazes Many 1000s on Madison Avenue

Among the most colorful, sensuous, diverse, and exuberant of all Manhattan parades, the India Day Parade on Aug. 17 served as a dance-friendly primer to the irreducibly diverse Indian diaspora—a mutton chop-era Elvis impersonator included.

Madison Avenue came alive as many thousands of brightly clad celebrants took to the streets that Sunday. It was the 43rd year of the event celebrating Indian Independence Day, whose historical date is Aug. 15, 1947. Billing itself as the world’s largest India Day Parade, the event is sponsored by the American India Foundation and left nearly everyone in attendance delighted and with their appetites aroused.

Appetite for what? You name it: music, dance, bright colors, cultural pride, spiritual affirmation, cricket, food, general merriment. The weather for all this was splendid, sunny in the comfortable 80s, with no reasons for complaint on the parade route itself, which stretched from 38th to 25th streets, or the attendant street fair in adjacent Madison Square Park

As for politics, it was both simple and complex, with Mayor Adams being the only recognizable local solon in attendance, though Indian-born US Congressman Shri Thanedar from Michigan was also seen. Representing Governor Hochul was Sibu Nair, deputy director for Asian American Affairs for New York State. NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch was also on hand.

For India, the nation’s consul general in New York, Binaya Srikanta Pradhan, was present—with his remarks on the importance of blending Indian culture with American values well-received—as was Indian Member of Parliament Satnam Singh Sandhu.

A Conflict Avoided

Why so many Big Apple pols chose to skip the event, including the mayoral aspirants, is open to speculation. August vacations are surely one reason. The history-minded might suggest that some city politicos were wary of controversy, following last year’s interfaith kerfuffle between Hindus and Muslims over the presence of float containing a wooden replica of Ram Mandir, a.k.a. the Temple of Lord Ram, in today’s Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. The temple was constructed on the site of a demolished mosque, and the display was seen by Muslims as Hindu intimidation.

Mayor Adams last year criticized the float for its political content, and it’s worth noting there was no Ram Mandir float this year. Indeed, block for block, float for float, no parade is more joyous or fascinatingly diverse.

How diverse? For starters, though nearly 80 percent of India is Hindu, followed by Islam at around 14 percent, there are also Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists, Animists, Jainists, and on down to the Baha’i faith and Zoroastrianism. India even has a few thousand Jews.

Considering India’s multiethnic population and Hinduisms plenitude of deities, it’s all one parade reporter can do to catch glimpses of the whole.

A Theme of Happiness, 100,000 Onlookers Strong

The theme of this year’s parade was “Sarve Bhavantu Suhkinah”—which translates roughly to “May All Be Happy, May All Be Free From Suffering.” The grand marshals of the event were Bollywood film stars Rashmika Mandanna and Vijay Deverakonda who, with Mayor Adams beside them, were greeted rapturously by the crowd.

Keeping that that crowd of more than 100,000 people in happy order was Patrol Borough Manhattan South Chief James McCarthy. For those who take well-organized parade for granted, watching the very active McCarthy as he makes his rounds up and down the route is a revealing lesson in attentiveness and personability.

Besides the headlining dignitaries, notable marchers and floats included: the NYPD Desi Society; the Jains of America; the Telegu Association of North America; the Miracle of Mind Sadguru, whose adherents wore matching T-shirts, held up placards with a QR code on it, and sometimes ran-danced in a fast-moving circle.

Speaking of movement, there was a female phalanx of adherents of Falun Dafa (the Chinese spiritual exercise program) carrying signs reading “Falun Gong Is Great.” They were stunningly clad in bright yellow tops, bottoms, and head scarves; pink ribbons; and white shoes.

Likewide in radiant satin were the ravishing sashayers of the India Times Network float, whose women were dressed in green, white, saffron orange, blue and white attire, the transplendance of which was darkened only by the swaying of their long back hair.

Among dozens of other parade participants were the Jallosh marching band; the Gujarat Christian Foundation; Ananda Marga Yoga; a multilevel Hare Krishna float pulled by ropes; Muslims for Peace (from the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community USA); and TV Asia, whose Indian and American flags festooned flatbed truck carried a bevy of jovial crown-wearing beauty queens waving to the ecstatic crowd.