Won’t let younger son return to US: Mother of engineer killed in Kansas Shooter thought he killed Iranians
LAST JOURNEY Victim’s body arrives in Hyderabad, rites performed
A grieving, wailing mother. A stoic father. A wife numb with shock. And distraught family-members. Heartbreaking scenes unfolded at the house of Indian engineer Srinivas Kuchibhotla as his mortal remains arrived at his hometown late on Wednesday.
Kuchibhotla, 32, was shot dead by a US Navy veteran on Wednesday at a bar in Kansas in a possible hate crime. Kuchibhotla’s colleague Alok Madasani, also an Indian, and an American citizen, who tried to stop the shooter, were injured in the incident. The last rites were performed at the Mahaprasthanam crematorium at Jubilee Hills later in the afternoon.
Kuchibhotla’s mother Parvatha Vardhini was inconsolable on seeing her son’s body which arrived in Hyderabad late on Monday night and brought to his parents’ residence at Bachupalli on the city outskirts. She continued to weep loudly as people helped her back into the house.
“I will not allow my younger son to go back to the US again. I want him and his family to return to Hyderabad for good.”
“He went to the US to serve that country. We were happy that one of the Kuchibhotla family went to the US for a better future. What was the crime he had committed for being killed?” She said he would ask her younger son, Sai Kiran, who is also employed in the US, to return to India along with his family.
“I will not allow them to go back. I used to tell Srinivas also to return, if he felt insecure there. But he used to say he was very safe and secure,” she recalled.
Kuchibhotla’s father Madhusudhana Chary’s reaction was pragmatic as he looked at his son’s mortal remains – dressed in a black blazer, a red checked shirt and tie and kept in the airconditioned box.
“I believe in the destiny. Whatever was destined to happen has happened. We only want that security of all our Indians working in the US should be taken care of,” he said.
Since the arrival of Kuchibhotla’s body at his residence last night, there has been a steady stream of visitors and VIPs including politicians to console the parents and his wife Sunayana Dumala.
Neighbours and family-members recalled how Kuchibhotla spent his days before leaving for the US 10 years ago.
“I just did not have the courage to see the body closely. It is heartbreaking to see him in this condition. He was always lively and smiling. But now, he is lying in a state of rest,” said his relative Venu Madhav.
bartender at the restaurant where a man was arrested last week for an apparently racially motivated bar shooting of two Indian men told a 911 dispatcher that the suspect admitted shooting two people, but described them as Iranian.
A recording from Henry County, Missouri, 911 reveals that the bartender warned police not to approach the building with sirens blaring or the man would “freak out” and “something bad’s going to happen.”
The man, Adam Purinton, 51, of Olathe, made his first appearance in court on Monday via video link. He has been charged with first-degree murder and first-degree attempted murder. According to witnesses, Purinton yelled “get out of my country” at two 32-year-old Indian men, Srinivas Kuchibhotla and Alok Madasani, before he opened fire at Austin’s Bar and Grill in the Kansas City suburb on Wednesday evening.
Kuchibhotla was killed and Madasani injured. The two had come to the US from India to study, and they worked as engineers at GPS-maker Garmin. A third patron, Ian Grillot, 24, was wounded when he tried to intervene. After the shooting, Purinton, drove 70 miles east to an Applebee’s restaurant in Clinton, Missouri, where he made the
shocking admission to the bartender. In the 911 call, the bartender, Sam Suida, told the dispatcher a man had come into the bar and said he’d done something “really bad” and was on the run from the police.
“I got him to tell me and he said, like, that he shot and killed two Iranian people in Olathe .... ”the bartender had said.