US President elect Joe Biden’s victory has set off a frenzy to trace his roots as well as that of his team members to different parts of India. The latest to celebrate the connection is Perumapalayam village in Erode district of Tamil Nadu which is proud of Celine Gounder, an infectious diseases expert, internist and epidemiologist who has been appointed to the American President-elect’s 12-member Covid-19 transition advisory board.
Gounder’s father, Raj Gounder was born into a poor farming family in this village and later migrated to the US in the 1960s. According to his family members, Raj Gounder studied under street lights and is the first graduate of the village. After his death in 2014, the family set up the Raj Gounder Foundation in his hometown to support education for children. Celine Gounder, 43 had come to the village last in 2018. Accompanied by her husband Grant Wahl, a sports journalist, she inaugurated a smart classroom facility at her father’s alma mater- Modakurichi Government Boys School.
On Tuesday night, Gounder spoke to her second cousin Devaraj Nallasivam on a video call about how the team hasn’t officially spoken to the American press but she was swamped with interview requests from Tamil news outlets. “Celine wishes her father could see that she has been given such an important responsibility,” said Nallasivam who is also secretary of the Foundation. “At least one family member visits us every year to maintain close ties. The entire village gathers at our home and Celine speaks a few Tamil words.”
Besides supporting her father’s school, the trust also provides daily meals to an adjacent special school that includes children with autism and other developmental disabilities. “Since schools are closed due to the Covid-19 pandemic, we have been delivering groceries to their homes,” said Nallasivam.
{{/usCountry}}Besides supporting her father’s school, the trust also provides daily meals to an adjacent special school that includes children with autism and other developmental disabilities. “Since schools are closed due to the Covid-19 pandemic, we have been delivering groceries to their homes,” said Nallasivam.
{{/usCountry}}Gounder is currently a faculty at the school of medicine in New York University. In 2015, she volunteered as an Ebola aid worker in Guinea and is an expert commentator on Ebola, Zika and opioid abuse epidemics for American news outlets.
American politician and New York City public advocate, Jumaane William tweeted that he received guidance from Gounder to develop the Covid-19 police responses and now, “the nation can benefit”.
She studied TB and HIV in South Africa, Ethiopia and Brazil between 1998 and 2012. “She is service oriented,” says Nallasivam. “She also conducts research on genetic diseases in our village during her visits.” Gounder’s aim is to work for underserved populations through the public health system.
Tamil Nadu chief minister Edappadi Palaniswami congratulated Gounder and another Indian-origin American Vivek Murthy for being part of the virus taskforce. With good wishes pouring in from Tamil Nadu and also questions about her last name-- a caste name (a politically influential community in the AIADMK), Gounder said her father had changed his name from Natarajan to Gounder as Americans had difficulty pronouncing it. My name is part of my history and identity, “even if some of that history is painful,” tweeted Gounder.