From Leo Varadkar to Harjit Sajjan, leaders with Indian roots have become household names in their countries after successful runs for office.

New Delhi: Lawyer Gobind Singh Deo assumed office this week as Malaysia’s first Sikh-origin cabinet minister, taking charge of the communications and multimedia portfolio. He is the second Indian-origin minister in Malaysia’s recently sworn-in government, the other is human resource minister M. Kulasegaran.

Fourteen years after the BJP led protests against Italian-origin Sonia Gandhi’s possible elevation as Prime Minister after the UPA’s 2004 victory, the idea of a foreign-origin leader holding public office remains fraught with tension in India. However, Indians abroad continue to scale new heights, with a conservative country like Ireland electing Leo Varadkar, whose father is Maharashtrian and mother Irish, as Prime Minister just last year.

Here is a list of some leaders with Indian roots making a mark around the world.

Leo Varadkar, Ireland

Leo Eric Varadkar has been the Prime Minister as well as defence minister of Ireland since June 2017. He is the first Irish minister of Indian origin and the fourth openly gay head of government in the world. At 38, he is also the youngest person to hold the office.

Varadkar was born and raised in Dublin, where he studied medicine at Trinity College. His father was born in Mumbai and moved to the UK to work as a doctor in the 1960s.

Pravind Jugnauth, Mauritius

Elected on 23 January 2017, Pravind Jugnauth is the Prime Minister and finance minister of Mauritius. He was born to a Hindu family, and is the son of former Mauritian Prime Minister and President Anerood Jugnauth. His father was serving his third term as Prime Minister when he resigned in favour of Pravind, a leader of the Militant Socialist Movement party.

Alok Sharma, UK

Alok Sharma, the British minister for employment, is a member of the Conservative Party. A qualified charted accountant, he worked in the banking sector for 16 years before entering politics. He is married and lives with his wife, two daughters and a dog.

Navdeep Bains, Canada

Since 2015, Navdeep Bains has served as Canada’s minister of innovation, science and economic development, and is also one of Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s key advisers.

Born to immigrant parents from Punjab, the MBA earlier worked for Ford Motors and Nike Canada.

Harjit Sajjan, Canada

Canada’s first Sikh defence minister, Harjit Sajjan was born in Hoshiarpur, Punjab, in 1970. When he was five, his mother took him and his sister to Canada to join their father, who was working as a sawmill worker in British Columbia at the time.

Sajjan has earlier served in the Canadian army as lieutenant-colonel, the first Sikh to hold the position. He came under fire last year when he called himself the “architect of Operation Medusa”, a Canada-led successful operation against the Taliban undertaken in September 2016. He later apologised for his “exaggerated” claims.

Bardish Chagger, Canada

Bardish Chagger, the minister of small business and tourism, became the first woman leader of the Canadian government in the House of Commons in 2016. Chagger’s parents moved to Canada from India in the 1970s, and she was born and raised in Waterloo, Ontario, the constituency she got elected from. She played a crucial role in Justin Trudeau’s campaign during the 2015 Canadian election.