Chances are you have heard of Zohran Kwame Mamdani as the newly elected mayor of New York who played ‘Dhoom Machale’ at the end of his victory speech. Either that or you may have, like many of us, first stumbled upon him swinging from a New York lamppost, mouthing lines from Bollywood blockbusters Karz and Deewar. In the reel that went viral with over 40 million views, Mamdani flipped those iconic dialogues into the language of his campaign: power to tenants, dignity to workers, transit for all. He had reimagined Amitabh Bachchan’s defiance for Astoria’s working class.
In that brief reel, just as in the rest of his campaign, one could see everything that fuels him: the instinct for play, the hunger for story, the belief that narrative forges belonging. This, coupled with over 90,000 volunteers canvassing for him, delivered him the historic win for the job said to be the most difficult in American politics after the presidency. “People don’t realise what a movement it had become. Over three million doors were knocked. Mamdani really met people where they were at. Literally. On the streets, in train stations, in cultural settings like gurudwaras,” says Hana Mangat, a writer and organiser from Brooklyn, who worked on Mamdani’s campaign.
Son of cinema and critique
Mamdani has lived at the intersection of art and agitation. Before turning mayor-elect for New York, he was Mr. Cardamom, the rapper exploring his Indian and Ugandan roots. His mother, Mira Nair, an Oscar-nominated filmmaker, gave the world Mississippi Masala, Monsoon Wedding, and Salaam Bombay!. His father, Mahmood Mamdani, has spent a lifetime interrogating colonial power and teaching others to do the same. From her, Mamdani inherited the camera’s empathy; from him, the scholar’s impatience with injustice.
It’s no accident that his politics feels cinematic. He well understands pacing, framing, and character. He builds tension, releases it with humour, and punctuates speeches like a filmmaker cutting scenes. On the campaign trail, he didn’t just talk about housing and transit. He scripted a collective imagination where immigrants aren’t footnotes, they’re protagonists. His campaign wasn’t the language of glossy manifestos or billionaire donors; it was the rhythm of bus routes and bodegas. He talked about free public transit. City-run grocery stores. Affordable housing. Childcare that didn’t cost a paycheck. It was the kind of unglamorous, everyday stuff that actually decides whether a city is liveable.
And in doing that, he turned mundane policies into matters of the heart. He made the working class visible again, not as statistics but as characters with agency. “He shows an integrity that I would like my children to see in public service,” says Aarti S., a New York City resident who voted for him.
Aarti S.
What began as a borough movement found resonance beyond New York City borders. With Mamdani’s quick wit, humour, and social media savvy, it spilled into national consciousness. For instance, the moment he spelled out his name for his opponent Andrew Cuomo became instantly viral, reborn online as the ‘Mamdani Song’, a cheeky remix of Gwen Stefani’s ‘Hollaback Girl’. People as far as Texas and Washington have been humming along to it.
A cultural shift
For South Asian voters who grew up on cassette tapes, pirated DVDs, and Sunday screenings, Mamdani’s Bollywood punch-up was more than nostalgia. It was rebellion. It said that culture isn’t soft power, it’s muscle. For generations, immigrants have been told to erase their identities to survive. The South Asian success story in America has been about fitting in: the Ivy League degree, the start-up hustle, the quiet pride of middle-class endurance, gratitude for the seat at the table.
Mamdani’s rise throws that narrative out the window. He refuses to perform the ‘good immigrant’ act of someone polite, apolitical, and endlessly grateful. He didn’t just pull up a chair. He built his own table and invited the city’s overlooked majority to sit beside him. And that’s a radical proposition in a culture that still rewards quiet assimilation.
“Mamdani becoming the first South Asian American mayor of New York City is not just a political milestone. This is a victory for every immigrant who came to New York hoping not only to live here but to belong here,” says Dilip Chauhan, a prominent South Asian community leader and former deputy comptroller of Nassau County.
In America’s political theatre, where immigrant candidates often sandpaper away their origins for mass appeal, Mamdani did the opposite. He used his South Asian identity as texture. He leaned into brownness not as branding, but as belonging. For the community, it marks a generational and cultural shift. Here’s a man who refuses to apologise for his noise. He’s brown, Muslim, socialist, loud, and still winning. “It’s a difficult time to be brown and Muslim in the country. I am excited that Mamdani is going to be representing us. I can already see momentum growing from his win and people realising that there is power in politics and voting,” says Nahiyan Taufiq, an organiser from Queens, who worked on his campaign. When he played ‘Dhoom Machale’ at his victory party, it was ownership, it was a joyous reclamation that told the crowd: we don’t have to mute where we come from to shape where we’re going.
Nahiyan Taufiq
The politics of timing
To understand the meaning of Mamdani’s win, one has to witness the mood of New York right now. Timing matters, and Mamdani’s couldn’t have been sharper. His win arrives at a moment when New York is tired of politicians who talk about equity while lunching with landlords. In a city as jaded as New York, authenticity is the rarest currency. Mamdani’s greatest gift was to sound unscripted in a space that thrives on spin.
The city that once prided itself on being the beating heart of liberal democracy had begun to look like a gated economy. The pandemic exposed faultlines that years of rhetoric had tried to plaster over: housing costs that make life precarious, public transit stretched thin, and a cost-of-living crisis that has left the city’s working class gasping for space.
While Mamdani has infused hope, there are questions too about whether he will be able to deliver. Many New Yorkers, even the ones who voted for him, wonder if his promises are feasible. “If he can reduce the cost of childcare, that would be great. Also, we need to retain our gifted programmes in schools,” says Aarti. “He said he would tax millionaires, but he does not have the authority to do that.”
Shyam, also a New York City resident, feels that Mamdani, with his inexperience, has been set up for failure. “Mamdani lacks experience, and there are many issues. Let’s take the example of rent freeze on apartments. 40% of apartments in New York City are rent-controlled. If the landlords are not allowed to raise rents, they are not likely to invest in repairing houses or building new ones.”
Despite these questions that also marked his campaign trail, the city has rallied behind him. For a city where immigrant energy has long been commodified but rarely celebrated, Mamdani’s ascent is a symbolic renewal. It says: the people who make New York work can also make it better. And that is the true meaning of his win: in not just the votes counted but in voices recovered.
The writer is an Atlanta-based journalist and USC Annenberg Fellow for Writing and Community Storytelling.