IndiaPost.com - Community shaken by student murders

India Post News Service

NEW YORK: The killing of yet another Indian graduate student on a US university campus has shaken the Indian American community, coming close on the heels of the murders of two students of Louisiana State University in December. Twenty-nine year old Abhijit Mahato, a Ph.D. student of Pratt School of Engineering at the Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, was found shot dead in his apartment at about 11.30 pm on January 19.

Moving quickly enough, Durham police on Jan 24 arrested 19-year old Stephen Lavance Oates Jr., on charges of Mahato’s murder and robbery. Oates was one of four suspects held in connection with more than 70 armed robberies in the area. Oates, it is believed, used a 9 mm handgun to shoot Mahato before stealing his money.

Meanwhile, two senior officials from the Indian Embassy in Washington DC were on the campus to meet with the University authorities and Duke’s Indian community, and also make arrangements for Mahato’s body to be flown back to India. In his bid to console his students in the wake of the crime, Duke President Richard H. Brodhead said, "I write to share my great sadness over the sudden and senseless death of Abhijit Mahato, a graduate student in the Pratt School of Engineering, who was murdered in his off-campus apartment this weekend.

Having spoken with Professor Tod Laursen, in whose lab Abhijit was making important contributions, I have a sense of his great promise and endearing character. I extend my sympathy to Abhijit’s friends and colleagues and to all members of the Indian and Hindu community for this appalling loss." Even before the motive of the crime was established as robbery, the Indian students on the Duke campus had ruled out the possibility of the crime being hate related. Prof. Vivek Wadhwa, Executive-in-Residence at Duke Engineering Management Program, told India Post there was no chance a hate crime being committed on this campus.

"You never know until the investigation is complete, but I know for sure that it has nothing to do with his being an Indian. At this University there is no discrimination per se, the University is very supportive. There’s always discrimination in the West, but this is nothing of that level. This is not a targeted hate crime. There’s no chance of that; that doesn’t happen to our students." Referring to the December killing of two Indian graduate students at the Louisiana State University, Prof. Wadhwa said, "Louisiana is a different story, I don’t know what’s going on there, but definitely there is no hate crime at Duke."

"Duke is a very open and friendly campus," he continued. "There are pockets in the South which are KKK (Ku Klux Klan) territory but not this part of the State… this whole Chapel Hill and Durham area is very open and inclusive, this is why I live here, we love it here." There are nearly 200 Indian students at Duke and, expectedly, the news of Mahato’s killing had parents and families of the other Indian students on the campus, frantically calling their loved ones.

"Right after the news broke, all our parents called and they were extremely afraid for us," Udai Kaura, a student doing his Masters in Engineering Management told India Post. "We are all very upset… we have a huge Indian population in Duke itself and are supporting each other." Kaura echoes the Indian students’ sentiments and Prof. Wadhwa’s conviction that Mahato’s killing was not a hate crime. "I think it’s a crime like any other, not a hate crime," he says.

"From the looks of it, it seems like just another crime in Durham. There were a couple of robberies the very next day, so I’m sure it’s a case of botched up robbery." "The Indian population here (at Duke) lives with everybody else, there’s absolutely no discrimination here at all," Kaura adds. Two days after Mahato was shot, another Duke student and an employee of the university were robbed at gunpoint in separate incidents close to the campus.

Kaura said the main issue now was the safety of the students, irrespective of nationality. "The campus itself is very safe, but outside the campus it’s not very safe," he says. "Security has to be increased, police has to do a better job." Prof. Wadhwa said the University has been putting a lot of pressure on the Durham Police Department to speed up investigations and get results. "The University can do only so much, they are as helpless, but they are doing everything they can," Prof. Wadhwa explained.

"The President (of Duke) sent out a message to the entire University boosting their morale. They are holding a mass in the Duke chapel later this week where they will be talking about Mahoto’s life and accomplishments. Also, our Dean Rob Clarke and Mahato’s adviser Tod Laursen called his family in India, it was an emotional call, but it had to be done." Prof. Laursen, who met with his lab team talked about Mahato, whom he described as intellectually curious, kind and outgoing. "He made friends very easily and always had a smile on his face," Laursen said.

"Our research team was particularly close to Abhijit. He was very well read in both poetry and literature, and enjoyed conversation with others about what they were reading." Prof. Wadhwa said the entire student body on the campus, and not just the Indian students, as well as Mahato’s faculty adviser Laursen were totally shaken by the incident.

"They have all take it very personally, everybody is upset," he said. Mahato, originally from Tatangar, India, was studying for an engineering doctorate degree focused on computational mechanics at Duke’s Pratt School of Engineering. He was in his second year. Larry Moneta, Duke’s vice president for student affairs, said the university has begun reaching out to Mahato’s friends and to his family in India, as well as to Indian and other international students on campus.

It is offering counseling services and has begun considering appropriate ways of commemorating Mahato’s life. "This is a tragic circumstance, and we are doing everything possible to assist those who may be affected by it," Moneta said. Before coming to Duke, Mahato worked for two years for the GE Global Research Center in Bangalore, where he focused on finite element analysis, a computer-simulation technique used in engineering.

The experience prepared him well for his graduate work, according to Laursen. "We were working together on an industry-funded research project and Abhijit’s prior industry experience helped him develop close working relationships with our partner," Laursen said. "He understood their needs as a business and was a pleasure to work with."

Mahato earned his mechanical engineering degree from Jadavpur University in 2001 and a master of technology degree from the Indian Institute for Technology in Kanpur in 2004. Meanwhile, the Duke University Police has begun increasing their patrols of apartments and other locations near the campus. Moneta said the university plans to meet with local landlords to discuss ways of enhancing security for students and other tenants, such as by fixing broken locks and enhancing lighting as well as improving transportation options to and from the campus.