Mindy Kaling's Brother Pretended to be African-American on Medical School Applications

Mindy Kaling's brother has become a target of social media and societal rancor at large after saying that he passed himself off as black, despite being of Indian origin, to gain admittance to medical school.

E! reports that Kaling's brother, Vijay Chokal-Ingam, made the revelation about posing as a black American in a new book he wrote, Almost Black: The True Story of an Indian American Who Got Into Medical School Posing as an African American. Ingam seems to be as concerned with spoilers as he is with sensitivity to race, since the title leaves nothing about the story to the imagination.

To achieve this "transformation", Ingam said that he shaved his head and trimmed his eyelashes. The medical school that accepted him must not have evaluated his appearance when he arrived. In photos, rather than presenting as a black male, he comes off as a cherubic eunuch with a complexion only slightly more swarthy than a cup of hazelnut coffee heavy with cream.

Despite all of his efforts, Ingam was only able to secure admittance to the middling medical school at St. Louis University. Ingam then dropped out of the program after only two years, claiming that he did not want to be a doctor. His pre-med school GPA of 3.1 suggests it is quite possible that he just couldn't hack it.

Ingam did eventually attain a tertiary degree however, at UCLA's Anderson MBA program. He applied and was accepted to that program as an Indian-American. As someone who sought to weaken and belittle the institution of affirmative action, one is left to wonder why he didn't bleach his skin and apply as a white man. Perhaps he was afraid his round face and unimpressive demeanor coupled with white skin would make him a true cherub.