Black and Desi? In a shocking twist, a US presidential contender finds Kamala Harris having multiple identities

Last week, Don-bhai, in his X chat with Elon-bhai, called Kamala-devi, as she appears in the latest cover of Time magazine as ‘like the most beautiful actress ever to live,’ adding, just so that there’s no rancour at home, ‘It was a drawing, and actually, she looked very much like a great first lady, Melania.’

But apart from the great Djokovic backhand compliment, Trump is really still perplexed if Kamala Harris is Indian or Black. In a public conversation at the National Association of Black Journalists in Chicago on July 31, the kamala-haired one said, ‘I’ve known her for a long time. Indirectly. Not directly, very much. And she was always of Indian heritage, and she was only promoting Indian heritage. I didn’t know she was Black until a number of years ago when she happened to turn Black and now she wants to be known as Black. So, I don’t know, is she Indian, or is she Black?’

He made it clear he wasn’t being disrespectful. ‘I respect either one. But she was Indian all the way. And then, all of a sudden she made a turn and became a Black person.’

Trump is fond of mixing diverse ingredients in his signature dish, soup. So, one has to look carefully to find the main ingredient. The crux here lies in two sentences: ‘A number of years ago when she happened to turn Black’ and ‘All of a sudden she made a turn and became a Black person.’ The rest is broth.

While Trump’s confusion is understandable, he needs to understand that we live in an enchanted fairytale world where magical transformations take place all the time. Who knows, tomorrow he might wake up and find that he’s been turned into a McDonalds Happy Meal. This is more complex than it sounds. He will have to make up his mind if he wants to be the patty, the bun, the cola, or the toy. God forbid, he might even wake up with an Afro in place of the curled kamala tongue he has for a hair piece. You never know.

Kamala is not the only Indian to suddenly turn Black. At the 1969 Woodstock concert, when Ravi Shankar was playing sitar, he turned into Jimi Hendrix before the exotic hippie crowd that found the Indian instrument so exotic – the sitar became an ‘Indian guitar’, billowing mad feedback from the speakers. And that was just the soundcheck.While Trump may have just stumbled upon this curious phenomenon of things and people having more than one quality, we don’t only switch ethnicities in these sudden transfigurations, but full-scale identities. Kamala can be not just Black or Indian, but – wonder of wonders – woman and Democrat, too! Or even a dancer to a marching band, as she chose to be last month in a video that went viral.Here’s the thing. Generally speaking, Black people don’t want to turn White. For instance, I’ve never seen a Black hippie in Varanasi or Rishikesh. Black folks know better than to come to India to ‘discover’ themselves. Also, trust me, Trump doesn’t need to worry too much about Indians wanting to turn Black. Kamala is an exception.

Most Indians still want to turn White and immigrate to the US of A. It’s true that fairness creams are not called that anymore, but the change is only linguistic fiddling. Skin-lightening creams, as they are called now, are selling the same old product in new tubes, and feeding the same need – to become Whites. What Trump really needs to worry about is a billion Indians turning into White people overnight, and coming banging on American doors. That’s when he’ll realise what a border problem really is.

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