State Appointee with Ties to Supremacist Groups Raises Eyebrows in Maryland

May 30, 2024

The appointment of a longstanding member of a far-right supremacist movement is causing consternation amongst Marylanders, according to transparency activists. Dr. Sudhir Sekhsaria of Potomac was appointed last year to the Maryland Economic Council, a select-group of business leaders from across Maryland with longstanding business interests in the state. Sekhsaria is a long-standing member of a number of local and national organizations tied to the Hindutva or Hindu Nationalist movement.

According to its website, the Maryland Economic Council’s “principal function is to provide economic policy advice and recommendations to the Governor.” Sekhsaria is an allergist with no apparent business acumen or relevant work history in economic planning. He is also a longtime ally of Lt. Governor Aruna Miller, having hosted numerous fundraisers for her and been an official on several of her previous election campaigns.

Hindutva is a supremacist movement founded by Nazi sympathizers in India during the Second World War, and several of the movement’s prominent founders endorsed the Holocaust. Last year, Time Magazine published an article by a Rutgers University professor about how Hindutva leaders are seeking to villainize Muslims and other minorities across India. Miller has denied any direct or indirect ties to Hindutva in the past. Activists and news reporting dispute her claims. 

Aruna Miller’s extensive ties to Hindu nationalists were first exposed by the No Hindutva Maryland Coalition in 2022. The story was then picked up The Intercept & The Huffington Post. Later, articles in Yahoo News, Salon, and Moderately MOCO further documented Miller’s ties. Miller was photographed in a selfie in 2014 at a rally for Hindu nationalist leader, Narendra Modi. Modi was banned for nine years from travel to the US for his role in orchestrating a pogrom against Muslims in India in 2002. Miller previously called Modi a “rockstar.” During the month of Ramadan, a national interfaith coalition — including the Indian American Muslim Council and Hindus for Human Rights — sent out a “red flag letter” urging houses of worship to not invite Miller over concerns she is seeking to “sanitize” her relationship with Hindu nationalists. Peace Action Montgomery, a member of the No Hindutva Maryland Coalition also launched a webpage detailing Miller’s and Sekhsaria’s relationship to Hindutva. 

“Lt. Gov. Miller’s Hindutva connections are concerning. Her former campaign treasurer, Sudhir Sekhsaria, significantly contributed to her political success and introduced her to influential Hindutva donors outside Maryland,” says Scott Webber,  a long-time Democratic activist in the state of Maryland. “In return, many of us believe Miller is granting Sekhsaria and other Hindutva leader extensive access to political leaders and policymakers, not to mention [Sekhsaria]’s seat on the Maryland Economic Council despite lacking much of an economic development background.”

Webber says he has known Miller personally for over a decade, and has had multiple conversations directly with the Lt. Governor. In those conversations, Webber has shared an extensive list of concerns regarding her ties to the Hindutva movement. Initially, Miller refused to acknowledge her ties in those conversations, only to relent and privately admit to him and others that she believes politics requires her to fundraise from Hindutva leaders. On the other hand, Miller’s public statements have repeatedly denied any relationship with Hindutva donors. 

Sekhsaria first came to prominence as Aruna Miller’s congressional campaign treasurer. Federal records show that Sekhsaria served in that role from 2017 until late last year, when a flood of national news stories highlighted Sekhsaria’s ties to the Hindutva movement. Sekhsaria is one of the Hindutva movement’s most prominent national figures, according to a Yale University publication from 2019. He has been affiliated with the Overseas Friends of the BJP (OFBJP), an organization which registered two years ago as a foreign agent, and which activists claim Aruna Miller has also had long-standing informal ties to. Sekhsaria has further supported Hindutva organizations such as the Ekal Vidyalaya for over a decade.

According to an article published by the internationally-focused news outlet The Diplomat,  Ekal Vidyalaya has a long history of indoctrinating rural Indian school children with Hindu supremacism and bigotry towards non-Hindus. Sekhsaria was listed on Ekal Vidyalaya’s website as a main point of contact for the organization’s recent fundraiser last month in Germantown. Sekhsaria proudly shared with the Indian American news outlet American Bazaar that he and his wife gave $30,000 dollars to Ekal Vidyalaya in 2018–while he was Aruna Miller’s congressional campaign treasurer. Miller denied publicly in 2018 having any association with Hindutva leaders, despite her treasurer financially supporting a major Hindutva non-profit the same year.

Sekhsaria’s appointment to the Maryland Economic Council is significant because of the access it affords its members to the state government apparatus, and the platform given to its members as hand-picked economic advisors to Maryland’s Governor.  For instance, the council has the mandate to examine the functioning of the Maryland Economic Development Corporation (MEDCO), Maryland Technology Development Corporation (TEDCO), and Maryland Economic Development Commission (MEDC), and devise a plan to coordinate each entity’s distinct mandates.

While all other council members are either top corporate executives or possess expertise in business management or economic policy, Sekhsaria is a medical professional whose appointment seems more politically motivated than intrinsically beneficial to Maryland’s macroeconomic policy. Other members include Council Chair Will Castleberry, who is Director of State Regulatory & Production Policy at Netflix. Mary Kane, the President & CEO, Maryland Chamber of Commerce, ​Jerrod Moton CEO, Goldman Edwards, and Brian Pieninck, President & CEO, CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield, are among the Council members. 

“It is inappropriate that someone with such extensive ties to far-right, supremacist organizations be in a position of power in Maryland. This is an example of the ways in which appointing pro-Hindutva officials opens the door to a pro-Hindutva government and speaks to clear Hindutva influence over future elections,” says Gayatri Girirajan a member of Peace Action Montgomery, a local chapter of the grassroots peace organization that has been advocating for transparency and accountability around the Moore-Miller administration. Gayatri is herself an Indian-American of an upper caste Hindu background, highlighting the diversity of opposition in Maryland to Hindutva’s sudden rise in influence following Aruna Miller’s election. 

Sekhsaria’s political involvement in Maryland began in earnest during Miller’s 2018 campaign for Maryland’s 6th Congressional District, where he served as campaign treasurer. Since then, he, his wife, and his medical practice have contributed thousands of dollars to Miller’s campaigns. He has also been a chief organizer of her political fundraisers, notably hosting an event in Houston attended by prominent Hindu nationalists, including Ramesh Bhutada, vice president of Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh USA, the American arm of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). Mahatma Gandhi’s assassin, Ramachandra Godse, was a prominent member of the RSS, and the organization has been thrice banned by the Government of India as a terrorist organization. Over 100,000 people have signed a Change.org petition in 2020 to re-declare the RSS a terror organization.

In a 2022 fundraiser, Miller publicly acknowledged Sekhsaria’s crucial role in her political career, highlighting the depth of their connection. “I would not be here today if not for your love and your encouragement of me from day one when I first ran for public office,” she said to Sekhsaria, according to a recording of the event available on YouTube. The video currently has 2,000 views. 

Sekhsaria has also donated to other major Democratic candidates, including Joe Biden, U.S. Senator Chris Van Hollen, and Democratic senatorial candidate Angela Alsobrooks. Sekhsaria has made three separate donations to funds set up by Alsobrooks for her election campaign, adding up to over $4,000, according to F.E.C. records.

“It definitely is scary how a man with well-known and documented ties to hate groups not only connects with the Lieutenant Governor, but is getting such extraordinary access to the highest levels of government,” says Robert Stubblefield, a prominent civil rights activist and church community organizer from Montgomery County. “It makes one wonder what else is going on behind the scenes in the Moore-Miller administration.”

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