US hearts bleed for slain Indian; Crowdfunding helps raise Rs 2cr

February 25, 2017

Washington, Feb 25: In an ideal world, an America of their dreams, they might have forged a start-up company called Kuchibhotla & Madasani. But a hateful moment in the American hinterland, spotty with prejudice, extinguished their dreams.techie

Srinivas Kuchibhotla and Alok Reddy Madasani conformed to the archetype Indian nerds taking a familiar route to the US. Finish undergrad engineering in India, go to US for Master's, and latch on to a job here through the OPT (Optional Practical Training) and H1-B visa route. Over the past decade, a majority of such IT professionals are from Andhra/Telengana region because of the proliferation of engineering colleges there.

Kuchibhotla, who went by the nickname Srinu, studied electrical engineering at the Vidya Jyothi Institute of Technology in Hyderabad before coming to US to earn a master's degree in electrical and electronic engineering from the University of Texas at El Paso, where he also worked as a teaching and research assistant before graduating in 2007. He began as a software engineer at Rockwell Collins and worked there until 2014, when he moved to Kansas to start a job at Garmin International.

Madasani, who was an aviation program coordinator manager at Garmin, had a similar background. He studied at the Vasavi College of Engineering, also in Hyderabad, before coming to the University of Missouri-Kansas City for his Master's. A cricket buff, he has a 2013 photo of Sachin Tendulkar as his cover photo on Facebook.

The two were regulars at the Austin Bar and Grill, where waiters told the local media they came couple of times a week to drink Jameson's and smoke over a basketball game.

Also a regular patron is Ian Grillot, the American who tackled the gunman at the first opportunity, believing he had emptied the magazine, but found his shoulder intercepting the last bullet.

''It wasn't right, and I didn't want the gentleman (the gunman) to potentially go after somebody else,'' Grillot said in a video released by the University of Kansas Health System, amid all-round praise for standing up for American values. He was ''just doing what anyone should have done.''

''It's not about where he's from, or ethnicity. We're all humans,'' he told the local media of the life he had saved, calling the survivor Madasani his ''best friend'' now.

Olathe residents, and Americans and Indians across the country, spoke from their hearts -- and their wallets as the incident ignited passionate discussions on social media. A funding campaign to help Kuchibhotla's family by aiming to raise $ 150,000 raced towards $ 300,000 within 24 hours of going up.

Among those who wrote on the site was Grillot's sister Maggie, who said, ''My brother was the third victim. My deepest condolences to the family- I'm so very sorry for your loss. My brother wishes he could have done more for your family. Keeping everyone in my prayers.''

Another message read: ''As a former engineer myself who has worked with many very friendly and hard working Indian engineers over the years I can't help but feel so badly for this man and his family... I'm horrified at this shooter's racism since I have never met an Indian native that I didn't like. Praying for Srini and his family.''

Indian consular officials are helping the victims' family and other Indian professionals come to grips with the situation.

But for Srinu's wife Sunayana, it is a tragedy beyond grief. ''Thanks for all those who made it to farewell parties!!!!! It was very difficult and emotional moment to leave you all, to start our new journey at Kansas,'' she had posted on social media in 2014 as they left Dallas.

One of her last posts from Kansas read, ''Totally enjoyed Hasee toh phasee -- a good movie after a long time.''

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Agencies
March 1,2020

Washington, Mar 1: Beginning April 1, Indians wishing to immigrate to America will now have to pay an additional $50,000 for the EB-5 or the US investor visa, a media report said.

Although, this additional tax would impact all visa categories, it will predominantly create a barrier for people investing in the EB-5 visa programme, the American Bazaar daily said in the report on Friday.

In 2019, the EB-5 investor visa programme, for the first time since the 1990's, increased the minimum investment amount to $900,000.

With this increase in minimum investment, the new 5 per cent additional tax would mean that applicants would have to pay the extra $50,000, when they move money to an escrow account in the US to fulfil their application criterion.

"The changes to the tax on remittances is a reminder to Indians to carefully plan their tax position before making the move to the US," the American Bazaar quoted Mark Davies, Global Chairman, Davies & Associates LLC, as saying.

"People seeking to emigrate who do not wish to pay this tax at source and rather account for it later may wish to move their money ahead of the new rules coming into effect.

"It is possible to pre-emptively move money into an escrow account in the US until such a time as they are ready to proceed with emigration process," he added.

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Agencies
June 4,2020

Washington D.C, Jun 4: A lawsuit has been filed against US President Donald Trump for signing an executive order on preventing online censorship that seems to violate the freedom of speech of individuals on social media platforms.

On Tuesday, the Center for Democracy and Technology filed the lawsuit against Trump's "Executive Order on Preventing Online Censorship," which was signed May 28, 2020. The suit argues that the Executive Order violates the First Amendment by curtailing and chilling the constitutionally protected speech of online platforms and individuals.

"CDT filed suit today because the President's actions are a direct attack on the freedom of speech protected by the First Amendment. The government cannot and should not force online intermediaries into moderating speech according to the President's whims. Blocking this order is crucial for protecting freedom of speech and continuing important work to ensure the integrity of the 2020 election," said CDT President and CEO Alexandra Givens.

The executive order is designed to deter social media services from fighting misinformation, voter suppression, and the stoking of violence on their platforms, the digital rights group said.

"Access to accurate information about the voting process and the security of our elections infrastructure is the lifeblood of our democracy. The President has made clear that his goal is to use threats of retaliation and future regulation to intimidate intermediaries into changing how they moderate content, essentially ensuring that the dangers of voter suppression and disinformation will grow unchecked in an election year," Givens said.

The law firm of Mayer Brown is representing CDT in this action.

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News Network
March 28,2020

Berlin, Mar 28: The number of confirmed coronavirus infections worldwide topped 600,000 on Saturday as new cases stacked up quickly in Europe and the United States and officials dug in for a long fight against the pandemic.

The latest landmark came only two days after the world passed half a million infections, according to a tally by John Hopkins University, showing that much work remains to be done to slow the spread of the virus. It showed more than 602,000 cases and a total of over 27,000 deaths.

While the U.S. now leads the world in reported infections — with more than 104,000 cases — five countries exceed its roughly 1,700 deaths: Italy, Spain, China, Iran and France.

“We cannot completely prevent infections at this stage, but we can and must in the immediate future achieve fewer new infections per day, a slower spread,” German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who is in quarantine at home after her doctor tested positive for the virus, told her compatriots in an audio message. “That will decide whether our health system can stand up to the virus.”

The virus already has put health systems in Italy, Spain and France under extreme strain. Lockdowns of varying severity have been introduced across Europe. Merkel's chief of staff, Helge Braun, said that Germany — where authorities closed nonessential shops and banned gatherings of more than two in public — won't relax its restrictions before April 20.

As the epicenter has shifted westward, the situation has calmed in China, where some restrictions on people's lives have now been lifted. Six subway lines restored limited service in Wuhan, where the virus first emerged in December, after the city had its official coronavirus risk evaluation downgraded from high to medium on Friday. Five districts of the city of 11 million people had other restrictions on travel loosened after their risk factor was downgraded to low.

For most people, the coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough that clear up in two to three weeks. But for others, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, the virus can cause more severe illness, including pneumonia, and lead to death.

More than 130,000 people have recovered, according to Johns Hopkins' tally.

In one way or another, the effects of the COVID-19 outbreak have been felt by the powerful and the poor alike.

On Friday, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson became the first leader of a major country to test positive for the virus. He said he would continue to work from self-quarantine.

Countries are still scrambling bring home some citizens stranded abroad by border closures and a near-shutdown of flights. On Saturday, 174 foreign tourists and four Nepali nationals on the foothills of Mount Everest were flown out days after being stranded on the only airstrip serving the world's highest mountain.

In neighboring India, authorities sent a fleet of buses to the outskirts of the capital to meet an exodus of migrant workers desperately trying to reach their home villages during the world's largest lockdown.

Thousands of people, mostly young male day laborers but also families, had fled their New Delhi homes after Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a 21-day lockdown that began on Wednesday and effectively put millions of Indians who live off daily earnings out of work.

In a possibly hopeful sign, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration cleared a new rapid test from Abbott Laboratories, which the company says can detect the coronavirus in about 5 minutes. Medical device maker Abbott announced the emergency clearance of its cartridge-based test Friday night, saying the test delivers a negative result in 13 minutes when the virus is not detected.

While New York remained the worst-hit city in the U.S., Americans braced for worsening conditions elsewhere, with worrisome infection numbers being reported in New Orleans, Chicago and Detroit.

New Orleans’ sprawling Ernest N. Morial Convention Center, along the Mississippi River, was being converted into a massive hospital as officials prepared for thousands more patients than they could accommodate.

In New York, where there are more than 44,000 cases statewide, the number of people hospitalized with COVID-19 passed 6,000 on Friday, double what it had been three days earlier.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo called for 4,000 more temporary beds across New York City, where the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center has already been converted into a hospital.

The struggle to defeat the virus will take “weeks and weeks and weeks,” Cuomo told members of the National Guard working at the Javits Center.

President Donald Trump invoked the Defense Production Act on Friday, ordering General Motors to begin manufacturing ventilators. Trump had previously rejected Cuomo's pleas for tens of thousands more of the machines and the governor's calls to implement the Korean War-era production law.

Trump signed a $2.2 trillion stimulus package, after the House approved the sweeping measure by voice vote. Lawmakers in both parties lined up behind the law to send checks to millions of Americans, boost unemployment benefits, help businesses and toss a life preserver to an overwhelmed health care system.

Dr. John Brooks of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned Americans remained “in the acceleration phase” of the pandemic and that all corners of the country were at risk.

"There is no geographic part of the United States that is spared from this," he said.

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