Four Indian American congress members, Ro Khanna, Raja Krishnamoorthi, Pramila Jayapal, and Ami Bera, received ICC Inspire Awards to honor them for their impact as members. To add to the magnificence of the night, it is also the second year in a row that ICC has given Indian Americans the Inspire Award. Last years recipients were Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayan, MasterCard CEO Ajay Banga and Cavium CEO Syed Ali.

All four members expressed the importance of receiving the award given their ethnic backgrounds. Ro Khanna discussed how reassuring it is to know that a country may have elected Donald Trump as president, but it didn’t fail when electing members of Congress. He continued to state, “It’s the most diverse Congress in American history. I think that’s the future. I’m convinced that that’s going to be the future of our country and you all made it possible.”

All four members gave empowering speeches, along with a challenge for society to bump that number of five Indian Americans in Congress to ten. Hopefully, the challenge will be accepted, and more Indian Americans will continue to play a prominent role in reforming society and its norms in the following years.