Amidst the ongoing rhetoric and escalating political temperature, a fresh controversy erupted following remarks made by Sam Pitroda. Upon reviewing the clip, it became evident that while discussing diversity and varied traditions and food choices, he oversimplified the ancestral diversity of Indian people residing across different regions. While his remarks may have been intended as an observation, they inadvertently risked diminishing the rich tapestry of ethnic groups in our nation.

According to the India portal (Government of India), ethnic group classification recognizes India as home to all five major racial types - Australoid, Mongoloid, Europoid, Caucasian, and Negroid.

The harsh reality is that as a society, we have internalized biases against certain racial groups, notably the Mongoloid and Negroid communities. We are the same people who, until recently, employed derogatory terms to refer to people from the northeastern regions. We are the ones who ridicule relatives and neighbors whose skin tone differs from fair complexion standards. We are the ones who seek remedies online to lighten the skin tone and ostracize those affected by vitiligo (depigmentation). We are the ones who insist on a fair-skinned bride in matrimonial advertisements and perpetuate the belief that darker-skinned individuals have no place in the entertainment industry. The list goes on.

Perhaps if we were taught that the entire human race originated from the supercontinent Pangaea and, over time, diversified into distinct identities - be they geographical, linguistic, or racial - we would have placed greater emphasis on that part of statement which celebrated diversity rather than resorting to oversimplified language used in that statement.