By IANS
Bangalore : Parents of Indian student Mahesh Subramannian, whose sudden death in the US Jan 20 remains unexplained, have written to the US as well as Indian authorities seeking early information on the reasons for his demise. His death was the third incident in less than two months in which Indian students in the US have died under abnormal circumstances.
“We just want to know whether it is a fault of his or something else,” Mahesh’s father P. Subramannian said here.
“We have written to the Indian embassy, the US embassy, the US hospital where he passed away and the university authorities to let us know early the reasons for his death,” Subramannian, an industrial consultant, told IANS Saturday.
Mahesh, a 20-year-old computer and electrical engineering technology student of Northern Kentucky University (NKU), died Jan 20 at St. Lukes hospital, a day after he was admitted there by his roommate, an American.
“Mahesh called us Jan 19 saying he had vomited after eating a pizza but was alright. He suspected that a piece of it might have entered his wind pipe and caused vomiting,” Subramannian said.
Later his roommate Sunny also called and gave almost similar information, he recalled. Subramannian said he did not know the full name of Sunny who was doing his post-graduation while Mahesh was due to complete his graduation.
Mahesh was the only child of Subramannian and Sharavathi.
“We are yet to get over the shock at the demise of our young son for whose education I had taken a loan,” Subramannian said.
Mahesh’s body reached here Thursday, 20 days after the death. The cremation took place Friday.
“The Indian embassy should have done more to ensure the body reached here early. Why so much delay? It was not a case of suicide or any other such acts,” Subramannian added.
“We are told that the autopsy report will take a couple of weeks to come. Our only interest now is to have the post-mortem report early so that we know the cause of death,” he said.
Mahesh was apparently popular among his teachers, classmates and other students of the NKU where two memorial services were held and a scrapbook was opened to send to his family here.
The Northerner, the student newspaper of NKU, carried a report Jan 23 on the death of Mahesh and quoted dean of students Matt Brown as saying that “he was smart and hardworking. He was really able to go out and do things”. It also said police do not suspect foul play.
In the earlier incidents, Abhijeet Mahato of Jharkhand, a PhD student at North Carolina’s Dukes Pratt School of Engineering, was shot dead at his apartment complex on Jan 18. Chandrasekhar Reddy Komma and Kiran Kumar Allam, two research students from Andhra Pradesh, were killed at their flat near the Louisiana State University on Dec 13, 2007.