Indian-origin socialist and NYC mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani came under fire after calling Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi a “war criminal” and equating him with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, citing Modi’s alleged role in the 2002 Gujarat genocide .
Zohran Kwame Mamdani is a New York State Assembly member and a democratic socialist.
During a public forum titled “New Mayor, New Media,” hosted by New York Focus on May 15, 2025, in New York City, Mamdani, the first South Asian man to serve in the New York city Assembly was responding to a hypothetical question about whether he would join a joint press conference if Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi held a rally at Madison Square Garden.
Firmly rejecting this, he said, “My father. His family comes from Gujarat in India. And his family is Muslim. I’m Muslim. And Narendra Modi helped to orchestrate what was a mass slaughter of Muslims.”
He went on to reflect on the deep scars left by the 2002 Gujarat riots, stating that people are often “shocked” to discover his identity as a Gujarati Muslim, explaining, “To the extent that we don’t even believe there are Gujarati Muslims anymore. When I tell someone who I am, it’s a shock to them.”
Drawing a parallel between Modi and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Mamdani called for accountability, asserting, “This is someone whom we should view in the same manner that we do Netanyahu… This is a war criminal.”
On 28 February 2002, following the Godhra train burning, Hindu mobs affiliated with the VHP, RSS, and BJP launched a large-scale, coordinated attack against Muslims in Gujarat, with Narendra Modi, then Chief Minister of Gujarat and now Prime Minister of India is accused of initiating and condoning the violence by instructing police to stand down as the attacks unfolded.
The weeks-long violence led to the killing of around 3,000 Muslims, the destruction of some 20,000 Muslim homes and businesses and 360 places of worship, and the displacement of nearly 150,000 people into relief camps under dire conditions.
Mamdani was among three South Asian elected officials in New York who, in 2023, condemned Modi’s NYC visit, stating they were “appalled” by his role in the 2002 Gujarat riots, for “jailing protesters, censoring journalists, and seeking to erase religious minorities,” calling him a threat to India’s secular democracy.
Who is Zohar Mamdani?
Zohran Kwame Mamdani was born and raised in Kampala, Uganda, moving to New York City with his family at the age of 7.
Zohran Mamdani is the son of Mahmood Mamdani, a prominent Ugandan academic of Indian ancestry and professor of anthropology, political science, and African studies at Columbia University and Mira Nair, an acclaimed Indian-American filmmaker celebrated for films such as “Salaam Bombay” and her exploration of diaspora and identity.
A graduate of the NYC Public School System, he attended the Bronx High School of Science and received a Bachelor’s Degree in Africana Studies from Bowdoin College.
In high school, Zohran co-founded his school’s first-ever cricket team, which would go on to participate in the Public School Athletic League’s inaugural cricket season. At Bowdoin College, he co-founded the college’s first Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) chapter.
He instituted a policy of “non-normalisation,” under which his group would not collaborate with individuals or organisations that supported Israel.
A few years later, in 2018, he became a naturalised American citizen.
Before representing the 36th Assembly District and its neighbourhoods of Astoria, Ditmars-Steinway, and Astoria Heights, Zohran worked as a foreclosure prevention housing counsellor.
Zohran Mamdani’s socialist politics are rooted in his work as a foreclosure prevention housing counselor, where he helped low-income homeowners of color in Queens fight eviction—an experience that revealed to him how the housing crisis was the result of deliberate, profit-driven policies rather than inevitability, and inspired his belief that a more just, people-centered system is both possible and necessary.
Zohran is the first South Asian man to serve in the NYS Assembly, as well as the first Ugandan and only the third Muslim to ever be a member of the body.
For too long, communities such as these have been left out of our state’s politics and priorities. Zohran seeks to amplify the voices of the preferably unheard across both the district and the state for as long as he remains in office.
According to the New York Assembly member biography page, “As an Assemblymember, Zohran fights every day for a future where each and every New Yorker lives a dignified life and where the distribution of that dignity is not determined by the market.”
He has fought for the working class in and outside the legislature: hunger striking alongside taxi drivers to achieve more than $450 million in transformative debt relief, winning over $100 million in the state budget for increased subway service and a successful fare-free bus pilot, and organizing New Yorkers to defeat a proposed dirty power plant.
Zohran believes that the future we deserve is one where housing, energy, and justice are for the many, not just the few.
Pro-Palestine stance
Besides co-founding the college’s first Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) chapter during his college days, he has been vocal for Palestinian rights. Mamdani has consistently supported the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS), challenging what he perceives as “exceptionalism” in the application of international law and human rights concerning Israel.
He also advocated state legislation to penalise Israel, and introduced two bills to end property tax exemptions for wealthy private universities like Columbia and NYU, over their ties to Israel.
At a 2021 Brooklyn rally organised by Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), Mamdani declared himself an anti-Zionist and stated, “It is Palestine that brought me into organising, and it is Palestine that I will always organise for.”
In his interview with Politico, he criticised U.S. funding for Israeli military actions, contrasting this with domestic underfunding, such as for public housing in Queensbridge.
“Why do they have to live in substandard conditions because the government refuses to fund public housing all while we continue to find billions of dollars to drop bombs that kill tens of thousands of Palestinians over more than a year now,” he said.
However, Mamdani has faced significant backlash from pro-Palestinian activists for acknowledging Israel’s “right to exist as a state.”
Election promises
Zohran Mamdani’s mayoral manifesto lays out a bold, socialist vision for New York City centred on housing, transit, safety, and equity.
He pledges to freeze rents on stabilised apartments, implement fare-free, faster buses, and establish a Department of Community Safety focused on prevention rather than policing. Mamdani also proposes universal free childcare, city-owned grocery stores to lower food costs, and a massive expansion of permanently affordable housing.
To fund these initiatives, he plans to raise taxes on big corporations and the wealthiest New Yorkers while cracking down on bad landlords and wasteful city contracts.
In response to potential federal funding cuts under a second Trump administration, which Mamdani argues would further strip resources from Medicaid, public transit, education, and other essential services, his administration proposes raising an additional $10 billion annually through progressive taxation and smarter governance.
At the heart of Mamdani’s plan is a commitment to tax fairness.
He calls for increasing the state’s top corporate tax rate to 11.5 per cent, the same as New Jersey’s, which would generate approximately $5 billion each year from fewer than 1,000 highly profitable corporations.
Additionally, he proposes a new 2 per cent city income tax on individuals earning over $1 million annually. This measure, affecting about 34,000 households, would raise an estimated $4 billion annually by targeting the wealthiest 1 per cent who currently pay the same flat city income tax rate as middle-income earners.
Mamdani frames these tax reforms not as radical departures, but as necessary corrections to decades of disinvestment and tax cuts that have favoured the rich, citing historical precedents under both Democratic and Republican administrations.
He argues that New York City, with its $1.3 trillion economy and a budget of $115 billion, has both the capacity and the responsibility to invest more in public goods like affordable housing, universal childcare, fast and free buses, and safer streets.
Beyond taxation, Mamdani’s manifesto emphasises the need for smarter governance.
He pledges to reform the city’s broken procurement system, which currently suffers from inefficiencies and inflated costs due to a lack of competition and delayed contracting.
The manifesto also highlights the city’s failure to enforce tax collection and recover billions in unpaid fines. By hiring more tax auditors and properly staffing collections departments, the administration expects to raise nearly $700 million annually through improved enforcement.
Mamdani contrasts his approach with the fiscal conservatism of former Governor Andrew Cuomo and the mismanagement under Mayor Eric Adams, both of whom he criticises for favouring austerity over investment.
The overarching message of the manifesto is that New York City can and must leverage its economic strength to protect working-class residents and provide a more just and equitable future.
Eleven Democratic candidates, including former Governor Andrew Cuomo, City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams, Comptroller Brad Lander, Assemblymember Zohran Mamdani, Public Advocate Jumaane Williams, and former state operations director Kathryn Garcia, are vying to replace Mayor Eric Adams, who is seeking reelection as an independent, while Republican Curtis Sliwa runs unopposed in his party.
According to a survey conducted by Public Policy Polling for Democrat Justin Brannan’s city comptroller campaign, Zohran Mamdani is narrowly leading Andrew Cuomo in the NYC mayoral race, polling at 35 per cent to Cuomo’s 31 per cent, a margin within the 4.1 per cent margin of error.
A Cuomo campaign poll conducted by Expedition Strategies found Cuomo leading Mamdani by 12 points, 56 per cent to 44 per cent, after eight rounds of ranked-choice voting.
Meanwhile, a separate survey by Data for Progress, commissioned by a Mamdani-allied super PAC, showed a much tighter race, with Cuomo edging out Mamdani by just 2 points, 51 per cent to 49 per cent, also after eight rounds of voting.
