Vice-President nominee Kamala Harris receives special prayer from ancestral village

Today the United States of America will vote in the election for the next President of the country. The decision will have ramifications felt around the world. And in particular, special prayers were held for the victory of Democratic Vice-Presidential nominee Kamala Harris at a temple in her maternal grandfather’s ancestral village in Tamil Nadu.

Harris had earlier shared the huge influence her grandfather PV Gopalan, a civil servant who served in India and abroad, had on her when she was a child. And with hours to go before polling starts in the USA, residents of the village – 390 km south of state capital Chennai – were seen lining up to worship at the local temple to see the 55-year-old become the Vice-President, reports NDTV.

Explaining the village’s connection with the family, Harris’s aunt Dr Sarala Gopalan told the media, “The Thulasendrapuram temple God is my father’s family deity. Whenever there is a marriage in the family or a special occasion, we visit the temple.”

The temple also has Harris’s name engraved besides those of many other donors, acknowledging her contribution of Rs5,000 in 2014. “We are happy and proud of her accomplishments. Kamala, who has her roots in this village, is in the race to become the Vice President of the United States,” the temple administrator said.

Earlier, the villagers had also put up posters of the Vice-President nominee wishing her success. She was born to an Indian mother and a Jamaican father and her position as a coloured American strikes a chord with both the African-American and Indian-American voters.

Poll predictions in the US put the Biden and Harris team in the lead against Donald Trump, who is fighting for a second term in office.

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