Ritu Jha-
Vivek Ranadivé recalled the night in 1969 when he held a transistor radio close to his ear, enthralled by the words of American astronaut Neil Armstrong after he stepped foot on the moon.
“I heard these magical words: “One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind,” Ranadivé told the cheering crowd at the recent BMMFEST 2024 in San Jose, California. “And I thought about these people who were able to send a man 250,000 miles away to land on a rock flawlessly, on the first try. I wanted to be like them, and I wanted to work really hard, and some way I was going to get to.”
Ranadivé was one of the key speakers at the biennial convention of Bruhan Maharashtra Mandal of North America (BMM), a non-profit organization.
The event brought together 5,000 Indian diaspora with origin in Maharashtra, India, celebrities, cricket legends, politicians, and artists, from across the world for a three-day celebration of Marathi culture, language, and identity.
Ranadivé, chairperson of the NBA’s Sacramento Kings, says Armstrong’s words inspired him to realize his dreams that he developed with Marathi values.
“My whole life has been defined by my Marathi values – love of family, respect for elders, hard work, emphasis on education, a deep appreciation for arts and culture, humility, love, and empathy,” Ranadivé said. “These are our values, Marathi values. And these are the values that have defined my journey.”
That marked the start of a journey that has now become an inspiration for many. Ranadivé said he focused on his education and got into IIT, and then into the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Getting into MIT was the easy part. Much harder was finding the money to get there and enroll. He went to the Reserve Bank of India and asked to see the chairman.
“I sat there and waited from the morning till the evening,” he said. “Finally, the chairman’s secretary took pity on me and told her boss about me. He agreed to see me, and I made my pitch on why I needed to go to MIT and why I needed some foreign exchange. He gave me one-quarter of tuition and $50 in spending cash. That was my victory and that set me on my journey.
“A few months later, before I boarded a midnight flight to America from Bombay, my grandmother said to me, she said, “You’re not going to be fighting anyone else. You could be fighting yourself. Your battle is with yourself. So just be the best version of yourself every single day. Now, that was the last time I ever saw her again. But her words stayed with me for life. These Marathi values define who I am. I tried to live up to those values that my grandmother challenged me to live up to.”
Ranadivé also shared his humble roots in basketball. As a single dad, he said he was trying to find ways to spend more time with his daughter Anjali.
“I foolishly volunteered to coach her basketball team, though I never actually touched a basketball before that. But then I thought, I should figure this out. I went back and studied the game, and I came up with a math equation for the game. They bought into the math equation, and we ended up winning every game. We took the team to the national championship. Malcolm Gladwell wrote a book about this called David and Goliath, and I fell in love with basketball.”
Ranadivé described what he sees as the steady advancement of Indian Americans in American society.
“I started my journey as Indian 1.0. And every Indian’s dream was to be an engineer at some company like HP. Since then, we have gone to Indian 2.0, and then we went to Indian 3.0 where we could run companies, and take them public. Now the community has got a lot of friends and members who are running the world’s largest companies. Some of us are also in the White House. We have Indians everywhere now.
“We are entering what I call civilization 3.0 right now. We’re sitting on the precipice of the greatest wealth and world improvement in the history of mankind. I’m very excited to be here, 20 years from now, Bombay will become the number one city in the world, and the next generation is going to make a lot of that happen.”
Ranadivé later sat down with indica for an interview.
“The next 10-20 years is going to be incredible for a young person,” he said. “The Marathi values are going to do good for them. They just need to work hard, persevere, keep learning, and be resilient. And to connect with the roots is a bottom-up effort from families and they still want to connect with their roots, and it’s just a progression and it will happen.”
Sanjay Subhedar, founder and Managing Director of Storm Ventures, and sponsor of the convention, said he is committed to maintaining the Marathi cultural identity in the U.S. He moderated the panel, “Beyond Doctors and Engineers.”
Panelist Ketki Dandekar, owner and co-founder of Pints of Joy Ice Cream and first time at the convention, said she came to the U.S. in 2002 and had been in the fintech space before she ventured into the ice cream business.
“As a Marathi person, I am extremely proud and excited to have broken into entrepreneurship,” she said. “It has taken us many decades to break that mold and we see so many new ventures now, which inspire me to build something of value for the community and for myself.”
Dandekar also has introduced Marathi ice cream.
“We have seen a lot of non-Marathi and non-Indian folks enjoy ‘Candied Ginger (ale paak) Basundi (Rabdi), Tilgul, Green mango sorbet, kokum sorbet. My favorite at this time is Chili Lime Guava.”
Another panelist, Omi Vaidya, an American actor of Indian descent, is known for his role in the Bollywood film 3 Idiots (2009), along with popular sitcoms The Office and Arrested Development.
“In 2004 there used to be a Maharashtra youth convention, Maitra,” Vaidya said. “I was on the board of that youth event. I learned about my Marathi culture there. Now BMMFEST is a larger event held every two years. It’s very difficult for Marathi people to connect and learn all of our traditions, Lavanis, our music, and everything about Marathi culture. Marathi people are doing wonderful things with the American influence and that is fantastic.”
Vaidya said Marathis born in the U.S. do not have a strong connection to Marathi culture because community presence is not strong in most cities.
“Unlike the Gujaratis and the Punjabis, who really have a huge influence, they do these big events, and live in enclaves of just Punjabis and Gujaratis. But now Marathis are coming to the U.S. in large numbers. I hope that the next generation of young Marathis knows a lot more about their culture, and they don’t shy away from it. I hope they really embrace their Marathi culture, but we will have to do a lot of work in pushing forward our culture.”
Vaidya said he made a Marathi film about being Indian and American as a means to reach out to the next generation.
“Hopefully, that will help them on their next quest. It is very difficult to bring together the American and the Marathi cultures, they’re very different and contrasting. But, there’s nothing bad about this synergy. I feel that I am unique because I have both the Marathi and American culture.”
BMM was founded in 1981 and has about 130 member groups in the U.S. and Canada. In addition to big events like the convention, the organization.
This year’s convention theme was “Kaay Bay,” meaning, “What’s Up?”
“Marathi have been here since 1960 and now we want to be BMM 2.0. Marathi 2.0 can lead our community in the future,” said BMM President Sanjeev Dixit.
The convention also brought in vendors from India to showcase their brands. Kamakshi Barve, founder and CEO of Barva Skin Therapie, said their products are organic and made of clarified butter.
“People who want to go back to their roots use our products,” Barve said. “In ayurveda, ghee is a healer, and if you use it daily on your skin, so clarified better is the best thing to use, so thought of making organic cosmetics from the base of ghee.”
Allhad Kulkarni, head of global operation for Chitale Bandhu Mithaiwale, Pune, India, said he sees the U.S. Marathi community growing. The company offers snacks made of peanut oil, in contrast to most products here that are made with palm oil. Aparna Padhya, who looks at U.S. operations, said they are partnering with local Indian grocery stores and offer air shipping to maintain the quality. The supply chain is their biggest challenge, while global war makes shipping difficult.
