Mamdani, the Ugandan-born son of Indian-origin parents — his mother is renowned filmmaker Mira Nair and father is academic Mahmood Mamdani — defeated former Governor Andrew Cuomo and Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa
Zohran Mamdani. Pic/AFP
Zohran Mamdani, the 34-year-old Indian-origin democratic socialist lawmaker, pulled off a stunning victory in the fiercely contested New York City mayoral elections, becoming the first South Asian and Muslim to be elected to lead the largest city in the US, reported news agency PTI.
Mamdani, the Ugandan-born son of Indian-origin parents — his mother is renowned filmmaker Mira Nair and father is academic Mahmood Mamdani — defeated former Governor Andrew Cuomo and Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa.
He won the NYC mayoral election, getting 948,202 votes (50.6 per cent), with 83 per cent of the votes counted.
He had been the front-runner in the NYC mayoral race for months and on Tuesday defeated Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa and political heavyweight former New York State Governor Andrew Cuomo, who ran as an independent candidate and received US President Donald Trump’s endorsement only on the eve of the election.
Cuomo garnered 776,547 votes (41.3 per cent) while Sliwa got 137,030 votes.
The NYC Board of Elections said that two million votes were cast, for the first time since 1969, with check-ins in Manhattan at 444,439, followed by Bronx (187,399), Brooklyn (571,857), Queens (421,176) and Staten Island (123,827).
Mamdani had upset Cuomo in the Democratic primary race for New York City mayor and was declared victorious in June this year.
“Zohran Mamdani is running for Mayor to lower the cost of living for working-class New Yorkers,” his campaign had said as the young politician continued to garner support among youth and working-class New Yorkers, who have been reeling under the burden of high costs and job insecurities amid a tough economic and political climate in the country, reported PTI.
With Mamdani’s win, New York City and the US entered a new political and ideological era with the democratic socialist now at the helm of a global financial capital.
Indian-origin Mamdani is the son of renowned filmmaker Mira Nair and Columbia University professor Mahmood Mamdani. He was born and raised in Kampala, Uganda and moved to New York City with his family when he was 7. Mamdani became a naturalised US citizen only recently in 2018.
New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani declared that his victory toppled a “political dynasty”, as he quoted former Indian prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru, saying the city has “stepped out from the old into the new”, reported PTI.
“Friends, we have toppled a political dynasty. I wish Andrew Cuomo only the best in private life, but let tonight be the final time I utter his name as we turn the page on a politics that abandons the many and answers only to the few. New York tonight you have delivered,” Mamdani said in his victory speech Tuesday night as the polls declared him winner in the 2025 elections to a rousing reception from supporters.
“We won because New Yorkers allowed themselves to hope that the impossible could be made possible, and we won because we insisted that no longer would politics be something that is done to us. Now, it is something that we do,” he said, reported PTI.
“Standing before you, I think of the words of Jawaharlal Nehru — a moment comes, but rarely in history, when we step out from the old to the new, when an age ends and when the soul of a nation long-suppressed finds utterance. Tonight, we have stepped out from the old into the new.”
(With inputs from PTI)
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