A new kind of citizenship has gained recognition in the 21st century. The multicultural citizenship or the global citizenship legitimizes the rights and needs of citizens to maintain commitments both to their resident communities and the culture of their origin.
India has always valued its Non-resident Indians or the NRIs for their financial contributions to the community they left behind when they ventured out for better prospects.
Indra Nooyi, an American citizen born to Indian parents is CEO and chairperson-designate of PepsiCo, the world's second largest beverages company. She was chosen as the India Abroad Person (IAP) of the Year 2006, on March 23 at a gala event held at the Roosevelt Hotel, New York City. This is the 5th year of the IAP awards.
In her acceptance speech, Nooyi, the highest ranking Indian in corporate America spoke about the joys of belonging to two lands -- India which gave her her heritage and America to which she owed tremendously for her future.
Nooyi credited her family- her mother, husband and daughter- that enabled her to scale incredible heights in a foreign land that she made her own some 29 years ago.
Salman Rushdie, famous for the novels that he has written, was given the first India Abroad Lifetime Achievement Award in recognition of his writing work.
Globalisation is helping the global citizens overcome the cultural, ethnic, racial, language, and religious barriers that exist in most nations in the world. In today’s increasingly interdependent global economy, each one of us can make a useful contribution as a global citizen.
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In a recent post I was calling out the need to organize the so-called community of global citizens. I do believe there is a strong force within that group to shape the world, if only we could organize it.
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