{"id":461323,"date":"2026-09-12T05:20:22","date_gmt":"2026-09-12T05:20:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/461323\/"},"modified":"2026-09-12T05:20:22","modified_gmt":"2026-09-12T05:20:22","slug":"25-years-later-what-9-11-means-for-bay-area-south-asians","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/461323\/","title":{"rendered":"25 years later, what 9\/11 means for Bay Area South Asians"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ragini Kaur was twelve years old when her Punjabi Sikh family moved from Thailand to Hayward, just one month before the towers fell.<\/p>\n

“I dove right into the post-9\/11 America,” said Kaur.<\/p>\n

Weeks later, a Sikh man in Arizona, Balbir Singh Sodhi<\/a>, became one of the first people killed in an anti-Muslim hate crime after September 11th. He was targeted for his pagg \u2014 the Sikh headwrap \u2014 and his beard.<\/p>\n

Kaur’s family, like many Sikh families across the country, were on edge.<\/p>\n

“What’s going to happen next \u2014 are we gonna be targeted?” said Kaur. “There was definitely a little bit of fear when you’re seeing your dad walk out the door, and hopefully he comes back home safely.”<\/p>\n

Since then, there have been a number of hate-crimes in California against Sikhs: vandalism<\/a> and shootings<\/a> at gurdwaras, physical abuse<\/a> and the recent messaging asking “Mr. Singh” to self deport<\/a> and to “get off our roads” from the Department of Homeland Security. <\/p>\n

All this pushed Kaur to become an activist, educating those around her \u2014 neighbors, classmates, local government \u2014 about the Punjabi Sikh American identity.<\/p>\n

\u201cLocally, the uncles and aunties I knew started participating in fourth of July parades \u2014 donning red, white, and blue, but also showing a little bit of our culture,\u201d said Kaur. \u201cWe’re playing \u2018This Land Is My Land,\u2019 but on Sitar and Tabla.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Ragini<\/p>\n

Ragini Kaur, the last person to the left, at a Jakara Movement New Year Eve\u2019s event at Fremont Gurdwara on December 31, 2019.<\/p>\n

Twenty-five years later, Kaur is now the Regional Director for the Jakara Movement<\/a>, an organization which provides services for Sikh Californians. Kaur, along with other Bay Area organizers say the fear that defined those first weeks after 9\/11 never really went away \u2014 it just took on new forms.<\/p>\n

As Sikh, Muslim, and South Asian communities mark the anniversary this month, longtime organizers with groups like the Jakara Movement and the Alliance of South Asians Taking Action are drawing a throughline from the surveillance and detention programs of the early 2000s to the ICE raids and deportations they’re fighting today.<\/p>\n

A different community, a familiar fear<\/p>\n

Sikhs weren’t the only ones vulnerable. Sabiha Basrai, who is Gujarati and Muslim, was 19 years old and starting her second year at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo when the attacks happened.<\/p>\n

\"Sabiha<\/p>\n

Sabiha Basrai, in the center, holds up a sign promoting non-violent solutions in the Middle East post 9\/11. <\/p>\n

“My apartment was vandalized, I received threats, and there were racist flyers put up around campus by the Cal Poly Republican Club,” said Basrai. “It just really changed my sense of self. I had to claim my Muslim identity as a political act, when before it had been a very personal part of my life.”<\/p>\n

Post 9\/11, the Department of Homeland Security<\/a> and Immigration and Customs Enforcement<\/a>, or ICE, was created, and the Patriot Act <\/a>was introduced to “intercept and obstruct terrorism.”<\/p>\n

A separate federal program, INS Special Registration<\/a>, required men from mostly South Asian and Arab countries to check in with the government. An estimated 1,100 people<\/a>, mostly Muslim and Arab, were detained across the country.<\/p>\n

\"Original<\/p>\n

Alliance of South Asians Taking Action<\/p>\n

Original order from the Department of Justice for special registration in December 2002.<\/p>\n

“There were local efforts in San Francisco to make sure that there was language-accessible know-your-rights information, and legal services available, for folks who were being called up to register,” Basrai said.<\/p>\n

Basrai said she knew she had to get involved. She became a member of the Alliance of South Asians Taking Action, or ASATA<\/a>, and sees its work as part of a much older lineage of South Asian organizing in the Bay Area. She traces the efforts back to the Ghadar Party<\/a>, an anti-colonial movement founded in San Francisco in 1913 to fight British rule in India. In 1917, the U.S. Justice Department indicted dozens of Ghadar Party members for conspiring against the British government \u2014 an early example, Basrai says, of the U.S. treating South Asian immigrant activists as security threats. She says that moment was just the beginning.<\/p>\n

“That really was a new era on the infringement of privacy,” Basrai said. “We knew back then that this was just testing ground \u2014 that this was something that would eventually be applied to everybody and we are seeing that come to fruition now.”<\/p>\n

\"ASATA<\/p>\n

ASATA member Swati Rayasam speaks at a protest in San Francisco after Trump\u2019s escalation against Iran. The protest was led by Arab Resource and Organizing Center and ANSWER Coalition in coordination with a global day of protest on January 25, 2020.<\/p>\n

In the years since, ASATA members say they’ve built lasting relationships with Arab and Muslim organizations, including the Arab Resource and Organizing Center. Those coalitions helped block an annual police militarization expo hosted in Oakland, scale back Oakland’s Domain Awareness Center surveillance system, end the Oakland Police Department’s partnership with the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force and organize protests outside San Francisco’s airport during the 2017 Muslim travel ban.<\/p>\n

\"Jakara<\/p>\n

Jakara Movement at Sacramento City Hall for Sikh Heritage Month on May 6, 2026<\/p>\n

In the East Bay, Kaur says Jakara Movement and her community met the moment by building awareness around Sikh culture and providing immigration-related services.<\/p>\n

“The generation that grew up in the 9\/11 era, we have become lawyers, journalists, filmmakers, educators,” she said. “This generation is ensuring that the next generation is not going through the same challenges that we did.”<\/p>\n

Both Kaur and Basrai say the fear of that era didn’t disappear \u2014 and now it’s manifesting in ICE activity in Dublin<\/a> and Gilroy<\/a>, both regions with large populations of South Asian immigrants.<\/p>\n

This weekend, to mark the 25th anniversary of 9\/11, ASATA, the Arab Resource and Organizing Center, the Center for Political Education, and Jakara Movement are holding a community discussion<\/a> on their shared history of organizing and the policies that led to the creation of ICE.<\/p>\n