Himachal native who was once homeless in NZ, gets elected as MP in Jacinda Ardern’s cabinet

Among the newly-elected members of the New Zealand Parliament on October 18 is a 33 year-old- Indian, Dr Gaurav Sharma, who won the election as Labour Party candidate from Hamilton West electorate. He defeated Tim Macindoe from the National Party with a margin of 4,425 votes.

Dr Gaurav Sharma immigrated to New Zealand around twenty years ago. A native of Himachal Pradesh’s Hamripur district, Sharma has a bachelor in medicine and surgery and works as a general practitioner in Nawton, Hamilton. He also completed his master’s in business administration from George Washington University in the United States.

According to the Labour Party, Sharma has been involved in public health, policy and consulting in several countries and also advocated rights for refugees and helped rebuild villages in Nepal after a massive earth quake hit the hill nation in 2015.

Sharma was studying in class nine when his father, who was an executive engineer in the electricity board of Himachal, migrated to New Zealand with his family. His dad took the leap, left his government job and decided to shift to a new country. However, his family struggled during the initial years in the country. Sharma’s father took six years to find a new job and the family has experienced homelessness- sleeping on parks and benches and used the Auckland City mission for arranging food.

Even if Dr Gaurav Sharma spend majority of his life in NZ, he had not lost touch with the place where he was born. He cherishes eating native Himachal food and liked to speak the native language Pahari in Himachal.

Congratulating him on his victory, Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur said the people of the state were proud of him.

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern delivered a huge victory for the Labout Party and is all set for her second term in office.