In Mamdani's New York win, India's Nehru finds an echo

At his New York victory rally, Zohran Mamdani gave a nod to Nehru’s iconic speech marking India's independence.

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"When an age ends and the soul of a nation finds utterance. Tonight we step out from the old to the new," Mamdani continued.

As Mamdani wrapped up his victory speech, the title track from the 2004 Bollywood hit Dhoom rang out across the hall - followed by Jay-Z and Alicia Keys' Empire State of Mind, now pulsing with new meaning as New York's first Indian-origin mayor made history.

Months earlier, Mamdani had turned Bollywood into campaign language, a nod to his South Asian roots - his mother is filmmaker Mira Nair, and his father, Mahmood Mamdani, a Ugandan-born scholar of Indian descent. On Instagram, he's recorded several messages in Hindi, often relying on playful imagery and dialogues from popular Bollywood films.

Invoking India's first prime minister on Wednesday was a final flourish.