Vance's wife's Indian roots celebrated amid trade talks

Indian culture was on full display as prime minister Narendra Modi rolled out a grand welcome for US vice president JD Vance, his wife Usha Vance, and their three children amid turbulent economic relations between the two countries.

- SHWETA SHARMA

For Usha Bala Chilukuri Vance, the first Hindu and first IndianAmerican second lady, the visit is a kind of homecoming,causing a wave of excitement and flurry of media activity in her ancestral village in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh. Born to Radhakrishna Chilukuri and Lakshmi Chilukuri, who migrated to the US from India in the late 1970s, Ms Vance was brought up in San Diego. She studied at Yale Law School, where she met Mr Vance, and went on to become a key figure in her husband’s political rise.

She traces her lineage to a Telugu-speaking family from Andhra Pradesh, specifically Vadluru village in East Godavari district and Saipuram village in Krishna district. While her parents stay in the US, her extended family lives in India. Her great aunt, Shanthamma Chilukuri, a 96-year-old physicist, comes from a distinguished family filled with doctors, engineers, scientists, and academics. She lives modestly with relatives and helpers in Visakhapatnam, a port city in Andhra Pradesh.