In the small coastal town of Bhatkal in Karnataka, more than 8,000 kilometres from Michigan, the victory of a man most residents have never met has been greeted like the triumph of one of their own. Democrat Abdul El-Sayed's win in the United States Senate election has set off celebrations in Bhatkal, because his wife, Dr Sarah Jukaku, traces her family roots to the town, and her family has been part of its history for generations.
El-Sayed, who is 42, defeated Republican candidate Mike Rogers in Michigan's closely contested Senate election on November 3, becoming the first Muslim American elected to the upper chamber of the United States Congress.
A physician and former director of the health departments in Detroit and Wayne County, he secured just over 50 per cent of the votes, while Rogers received more than 47 per cent, with approximately 52 per cent of the votes counted at the time the result was projected.
The victory marks a significant political milestone in the United States, and it has drawn attention far beyond Michigan, to a town on Karnataka's western coast where his wife's family name is familiar to everyone.
Sarah Jukaku is a psychiatrist who was born and raised in Michigan, but her family story begins in Bhatkal, a historic Muslim-majority town in Karnataka's Uttara Kannada district, about 140 kilometres from Mangaluru. The Jukaku family belongs to the Nawayath community, an ancient Muslim merchant community, mostly from Yemen, Arab, Iran and Iraq, which settled in the coastal towns of southern India over the last 600 years.
In Bhatkal, the family is credited with playing a key role in the development of the region around 75 years ago, even before the formation of the state of Karnataka.
The central figure in that story is Sarah's grandfather, Jukaku Shamsuddin. A prominent lawyer, he was the first lawyer from the Nawayath community and also the first from the community to be made a minister. He served as the deputy finance minister in the Mysore government under Chief Minister B. D. Jatti in the 1950s, and during his tenure the town is said to have seen visionary development of a kind never seen before.
"Planning of town, roads, electricity, education institutions... you name it and he had done it in Bhatkal," says journalist Aftab Husain Kola, the author of the book "JH Shamshuddin - Service Above Self". Kola says Shamsuddin was regarded for his commitment to principles and for always holding the moral high ground.
Shamsuddin is remembered in Bhatkal for bringing electricity and other essential infrastructure to the town and the surrounding areas, and one of the town's busy intersections was named Shamsuddin Circle in his honour. The charitable trust Anjuman Hami-e-Muslimeen, which runs educational institutions in Bhatkal, has named its administrative building after him. He died at the age of 52, leaving behind his wife Zubeidah Begum, six daughters and four sons.
After his death, the families began to move to different parts of the country to pursue education and trade, and many of them settled in Bengaluru.
Sarah's father, Dr Jukaku S. Tayeb, was one of them. Born and raised in Bhatkal, he enrolled for medical education at Bangalore Medical College in 1976. He then left for the Middle East before settling in Michigan in the 1980s, where he worked as a nephrologist. It was in Michigan that Sarah was born and raised, and where she later met El-Sayed. She joined him on stage at his final campaign rally in Detroit and stood by his side on election night as the results came in.
For the Jukaku family in Bhatkal, the victory carries a special significance that goes beyond politics. A cousin of Sarah's, Jukaku Shamshuddin Zia, who is named after their grandfather, says the family was delighted to see El-Sayed in the political spotlight and drew comparisons between him and Shamsuddin, particularly their commitment to honesty and public service.
Zia, who shuttles between Dubai and Bengaluru, told The Indian Express that the family was proud of what El-Sayed had been able to achieve. "He is a man of values and principles who has been working for the public. We are happy that he is now the Senate candidate," he said.
Zia also recalled how the family had kept its connection with Bhatkal alive over the years. Until a few years ago, Sarah and her parents made it a point to visit Bengaluru and Bhatkal with the whole family to help them stay in touch with their roots. They used to meet Shamsuddin's friends and relatives in the town, though those visits have now come down drastically.
Despite the family's political leanings, Zia says they rarely discuss politics in the family WhatsApp group that Sarah is also part of. "All children and grandchildren are part of the group. Sarah does share information related to the family and we usually have good conversations," he said.
The election result has been followed closely in Bhatkal, where family members reportedly prayed for El-Sayed's victory and celebrated when it was confirmed. For the town's Nawayath Muslim community, the milestone reflects a remarkable journey connecting its centuries-old heritage on India's western coast with the highest levels of political representation in the United States.
The story of a family that helped build a small coastal town, sent its children out into the world to study and work, and now finds itself linked by marriage to a United States Senator, has captured the imagination of people far beyond Bhatkal.
El-Sayed's victory is historic in its own right. He is the first Muslim to be elected to the United States Senate, and his win came in one of the most closely watched races of the midterm elections. As a physician who ran health departments in Detroit and Wayne County, he campaigned on public health and public service, themes that his wife's family in Bhatkal say echo the work of her grandfather, who spent his life building the institutions of a small town.
The parallel is one the family itself has drawn, and it is the reason the celebrations in Bhatkal feel personal rather than distant.
The result also adds to a remarkable night for candidates of South Asian origin in the American midterm elections. On the same night, Kerala-born Nithya Raman won the race for mayor of Los Angeles, becoming the first Indian-origin mayor of the United States' second-largest city.
Together, the two victories underline the growing presence of South Asian Americans in the highest levels of American politics, and the deep and often unexpected ties that connect their families to towns and communities across India.
For Bhatkal, the connection to the new Senator is a source of pride and a reminder of how far its people have travelled. A community that arrived on India's southwestern coast from across the Arabian Sea centuries ago, built its life around trade and education, and produced a minister who brought electricity and roads to a small town, now counts a United States Senator among its extended family. The distance between Bhatkal and Michigan is 8,000 kilometres.
On the night of November 3, it felt a great deal shorter.
(Reporting based on The Indian Express, The Times of India and Times Now.)