Indian Genius: The Meteoric Rise of Indians in America

by Meenakshi Ahamed

Overview

It is virtually impossible to turn on CNN, read the Wall Street Journal, go to a hospital, attend a university, or browse a bookstore without encountering a sea of Indian names and faces. In her new book, INDIAN GENIUS: The Meteoric Rise of Indians in America (Harper360; February 28, 2025), author and journalist Meenakshi Ahamed provides fascinating portraits of the Indian Americans at the forefront of the wave of Indian success stories.

Ahamed's brilliant portraits of such well-known figures as Satya Nadella, Vinod Khosla, Shantanu Narayen, Chandrika Tandon, Nikesh Arora, Siddhartha Mukherjee, Deepak Chopra, Nikki Haley, and Fareed Zakaria populate the pages of her book. Based on a series of interviews and full of fresh and surprising stories, INDIAN GENIUS reveals the private strengths that made possible each individual's public achievements.

What accounts for Indian Americans' remarkable ability to break into mainstream American culture and their meteoric rise within its ranks? Other immigrant groups have found success in the U.S., but none have rocketed so far and so fast, reaching heights in a single generation that have taken other groups the better part of a century to achieve. In INDIAN GENIUS, Ahamed focuses on three areas where Indian Americans have had a singular impact: tech, medicine and public policy.

The per capita income of Indian Americans far exceeds that of any ethnic group. According to a 2018 survey by the Pew Research Center, the median annual household income for Indian Americans is $100,000 higher than other Asian Americans ($75,000) and the general population ($53,600). Indians were also the most highly educated; 72 percent are college graduates, compared to 51 percent of other Asians and 30 percent of the rest of the population.

It is essential reading for anyone interested in the path to success in America.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9789365692402
Publisher:	HarperCollins Publishers India
Publication date:	03/04/2025
Pages:	360
Product dimensions:	6.50(w) x 1.50(h) x 9.50(d)

About the Author

MEENAKSHI NARULA AHAMED is a freelance journalist and the author of A Matter of Trust: India-US Relations from Truman to Trump, a sweeping narrative history of the turbulent seventy-year relationship between the two countries.

Ahamed's writing has been published in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Atlantic, CNN, The Wall Street Journal, Seminar and Asian Age. She has worked at the World Bank in Washington, DC, and for NDTV, and has served on the boards of Doctors without Borders, Drugs for Neglected Diseases and the Vellore Christian Medical College Foundation.

Ahamed was born in Calcutta and received an MA from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. She divides her time between New York, Los Angeles and New Delhi.

Editorial Reviews

"Buoyant ... an upbeat, informative look at immigrant contributions to America." - Publishers Weekly

"Indian Genius is an essential work for understanding the story of modern America. With captivating profiles, Meenakshi Ahamed details how extraordinary Indian Americans are shaping the future in this country, from Silicon Valley to Washington, D.C." -Eric Schmidt, Former CEO & Chairman, Google

"Through revealing interviews and insightful profiles, Meenakshi Ahamed shares the extraordinary stories and wisdom of some of America's most successful Indian immigrants. How they managed opportunities and obstacles, embraced change, and dealt with crises on their way to the top makes this an inspirational book!" -Nandan Nilekani, Co-founder and Chairman, Infosys, and Founding Chairman UIDAI (Aadhaar)

"Indian Genius is a splendid combination of history, biography, and inspiration. Every American should read and treasure Ahamed's brilliant and captivating new book and learn about the magnificent contributions of Indian Americans."-Michael Beschloss, Presidential Historian

From the Publisher

2024-12-11
Making it in America.

When Ahamed arrived in suburban Boston in 1970, she felt “an acute sense of disappointment,” she writes. “What were these quaint, old-fashioned houses doing in the land that had sent men and rocket ships to the moon?” The silence of her new home made her long for the noise and liveliness of her native India. In the ensuing decades, her opinions changed—so much so that she was inspired to write a book about her adopted country and to explore the contributions that Indian Americans have made to American culture and society. Ahamed chose to focus on three fields: tech, medicine, and public policy. Each section of the book features interviews and profiles of Indian American leaders, including Sun Microsystems founder Vinod Khosla, author and neurosurgeon Atul Gawande, and 2024 Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley. Most of the leaders Ahamed profiles are men; the exceptions are Haley, as well as sisters and businesswomen Chandrika Tandon and Indra Nooyi, who share a chapter. While several of the interviews present fascinating insights into the characters of these high-profile people—for example, legal scholar Neal Katyal discusses how taking improv classes improved his performance arguing in front of the Supreme Court—the book lacks overall coherence, jumping between leaders without drawing sufficient connections between their attitudes and histories. Ahamed’s implicit definition of success seems to involve amassing degrees from elite institutions and becoming wealthy, an approach that not only reinscribes the model minority myth, but also is debunked by interviewees like Surgeon General Vivek Murthy.

A problematic survey of Indian Americans’ accomplishments.

Kirkus Reviews