Anand: Indian-origin Kash Patel officially took charge as the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) on Friday, with his sister Nisha Patel, girlfriend Alexis Wilkins, and other relatives in attendance.

Patel, who took the oath of his office on the Bhagavad Gita, has ancestral ties to Bhadran village in Gujarat’s Anand district. His family migrated from Bhadran to Uganda nearly 70 to 80 years ago, according to members of the Patidar community.

Born in New York in 1980, the 44-year-old is the first Indian-American to lead the premier US law enforcement agency. Leaders of the Patidar community said his close relatives are settled abroad, and the family sold their ancestral property in Bhadran after moving to Africa. The Chh Gam Patidar Mandal, an Anand-based community organization, maintains a family tree (vanshavali)that includes details of Patel’s father, Pramod Patel, his grandfather, and brothers.

Community leader Rajesh Patel, who also heads the Anand district BJP, noted that Kash Patel’s name is yet to be added to the family records, but 18 generations of his ancestors are documented. He mentioned that Patel’s family briefly returned to India in the 1970s after being expelled from Uganda during Idi Amin’s regime, before moving to Canada and later settling in the US.

A trained lawyer, Patel studied at the University of Richmond and later earned his law degree with a Certificate in International Law from University College London. He previously served as Chief of Staff to Acting Secretary of Defense Christopher Miller, overseeing key defense operations. In an earlier interview, Patel had proudly stated, “We are Gujarati.” DeshGujarat