India demands 'strongest action' from US after Kansas killing

It comes ahead of India’s top diplomat foreign secretary S Jaishankar's visit to Washington this week for talks with the new US administration, and concerns about the safety of foreigners.

Srinivas Kuchibhotla, right, poses for photo with his wife Sunayana Dumala in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Kuchibhotla and his friend Alok Madasani were in a bar in Kansas on Feb 22, 2017 when a man cried out:Show more

NEW DELHI // India on Sunday demanded the “strongest action” from the US government after an Indian man was killed and another wounded in a suspected hate crime in the midwestern state of Kansas.

The two men, who had been living in the US for the last few years, were shot at a bar outside Kansas City late Wednesday.

“USA should respond to this incident. American president and people of America, they should come out openly to condemn such actions ... and then take strongest action,” information and broadcasting minister M Venkaiah Naidu said, according to the Press Trust of India.

Srinivas Kuchibhotla, 32, was killed and Alok Reddy Madasani, 32, wounded in the attack. Both men worked as aviation systems engineers for GPS manufacturer Garmin.

“These kind of incidents involving racial discrimination are shameful,” Mr Naidu said in the southern city of Hyderabad where the victims’ families live.

US authorities have arrested Adam Purinton, 51, who allegedly told the men “get out of my country!” before opening fire.

Mr Purinton was detained on Wednesday at a restaurant after claiming he had killed two Middle Easterners.

He has been charged with premeditated first-degree murder and two counts of attempted premeditated first-degree murder and is being held on a US$2 million (Dh7.34m) bond.

The FBI is trying to determine if the shooting was a hate crime.

Madasani’s parents were due to leave for the US on Sunday.

His father Jagan Mohan Reddy, a chief engineer with the Telangana state government, said they would spend at least a week in the US before “taking stock of what to do [next]”.

“They lost a dear friend [Kuchibhotla] in the attack but somehow, by God’s grace, my son survived,” Mr Reddy said.

He said his son and the deceased were very good friends and had known each other for at least six or seven years in the US.

“It is unthinkable that they have been separated like this,” he added.

The shooting has made headlines in the Indian media, amid concern that the hardline immigration policies of president Donald Trump may have laid the groundwork for such an attack.

India’s top diplomat foreign secretary S Jaishankar will visit Washington this week for talks with the new US administration, an Indian foreign ministry official announced on Sunday.

He is expected to discuss with US officials India’s concerns over proposed US legislation that could make it harder for companies to replace American workers with those from India and other countries. Also expected to be on the agenda during Mr Jaishankar’s four-day visit, which begins Tuesday, is safety for foreigners following the Kansas bar shooting.

* Agence France-Presse and Associated Press