Maryland (US): Aruna Miller, born in Hyderabad city of India, has been elected as the lieutenant governor of the US state of Maryland. She has become the first Indian-American politician to be elected to this post.
Aruna, 58, former delegate to the Maryland House, Made history when the Democrat became the 10th Lieutenant Governor of the state.
On Wednesday, Aruna was sworn in as the tenth lieutenant governor of the state. In this regard, he tweeted, “We have created history. But the power is not in the making of history, but the power is in the hands of the people. This is just the beginning of a journey.”
“I spent most of my life trying to fit in the space that didn’t have me and mine, as an immigrant growing up in a new country, or as a female engineer in a male dominated field, as an Indian American legislator in a legislature that looked nothing like me. It took me a long time to realise that it was never about needing to fit into a space created by others. It was always about having the courage to be my authentic self in every space,” she said.
“Maryland, I am humbled and honoured to be your Lieutenant Governor. We are only just getting started!,” Miller tweeted.
Thank you, Maryland. You mean the world to us and more. pic.twitter.com/qCfYUUa1dH
— Aruna Miller (@arunamiller) January 19, 2023
Aruna’s father, who migrated after the passage of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 removed racial and national-origin quotas to allow a new generation of immigrants to enter the United States, returned to India in 1972 to tell Aruna’s grandmother, with whom she had lived since she was about 1 year old, that it was time for his daughter to join him, her mother and two siblings in the United States, the Post reported.
“My dad was a stranger to me. My siblings were strangers to me, my mom, all of it,” said Miller, who also said she doesn’t remember any of her time in India as a child because of the trauma she said she experienced leaving her grandmother.
She learned English while attending public school. She graduated from Missouri University of Science and Technology, thanks in part to the Pell grants she received after her father lost his job because of his illness.