Another Indian-origin student found dead in US; 5th incident since January

An Indian-origin student who was pursuing a doctoral degree at Purdue University in Indiana, United States, has been found dead, reported local media on Wednesday.

A report in Indiana-based Journal & Courier, quoting the Warren County Coroner’s office, said that the 23-year-old Sameer Kamath was found dead at a nature preserve on Monday evening. His LinkedIn profile has been ‘memorialised’ as of now.

“Kamath was found about 5 pm Monday at Crow’s Grove Nature Preserve at 3300 North Warren County Road 50 West, in Williamsport,” Warren County Coroner Justin Brummett said in a press release on Tuesday afternoon, said the report.

Kamath, who was a US citizen, was pursuing a doctoral degree at the Mechanical Engineering Department of Purdue University. He had graduated with a master’s degree from the same department in August 2023, said the J&C report.

An autopsy will be performed on Tuesday afternoon. His family has been notified. A report in the student-run The Exponent said that his department head confirmed the death. An investigation into the circumstances of the death is ongoing, said the report.

Kamath is the fifth Indian-origin student to be killed in the US since January 2024. Last week, Neel Acharya, an Indian computer science and data science student at Purdue University in Indiana, had been reported missing by his mother. He was found dead on campus.

Prior to that, Shreyas Reddy Benigeri, a student at Lindner School of Business in Cincinnati, was found dead in Ohio last week. “Police investigation is underway. At this stage, foul play is not suspected,” the Consulate General of India in New York had said in a post on X.

On January 16, Vivek Saini, an MBA graduate in the US, was brutally killed with repeated blows from a hammer by a homeless man inside a store in Lithonia, Georgia. On January 20, Akul Dhawan, an 18-year-old Indian-American student, was found dead with signs of hypothermia on the back porch of a building near the University of Illinois.

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