Hemanth Kumar Puttur: December 3, 1973 – September 11, 2001
Hemanth Kumar Puttur grew up in the town of Puttur in India, a town known for its agriculture and located 30 miles or so from the city of Mangalore. Puttur’s father, Anand, ran a small tailoring shop, making enough money for his family to live on.
A quiet, home-loving boy and the youngest of three siblings, Hemanth dreamed of one day making the kind of money that could lift his family to a more comfortable life. In order to do that, he knew he would have to get into college and he spent his childhood committed to his studies, family members say. He had a small group of friends, all similarly intelligent and ambitious, and he found he had a knack for engineering.
Puttur went to St. Philomena Boys’ High School, where his studious nature began to pay off. He earned good grades and was accepted to K.V.G. Engineering College in Karnataka, India. In 1995, he graduated with a bachelor’s degree in engineering.
When he wasn’t hitting the books, Puttur loved to play cricket. A member of the Billava caste of Hindu, was very god-fearing and disciplined, family members say.
After completing his college studies, Puttur landed a job with Shibumi Computer Systems in Bangalore. His stint at the company lasted just more than a year and in June of 1997, he was hired by Wipro Technologies, one of the largest IT companies in India.
At Wipro, Puttur’s career began to take off. Just 23 years old when he was hired, he was quickly becoming the breadwinner of the family.
Puttur’s work took him all around the world. In 1999 he was sent to Leeds, England, to work with some of the company’s British clients. Later that year he worked in Chicago, his first real taste of America. In 2001, he got his biggest and most promising assignment to date. He joined Wipro client Marsh & McLennan, a professional services and insurance brokerage firm, as a database manager. The quiet home-loving boy from Puttur, India would be working in the tallest skyscraper of one of the biggest cities in the world – his office was on the 97th floor of the North Tower.
Puttur, who lived in White Plains while working for Marsh & McLennan, didn’t have much trouble adjusting to American big-city life. He asked Anand and his mother, Kusuma, to come visit him. Still, according to his family members, he saw his time in the U.S. as a way to advance his career and explore the world. His plan was to ultimately settle down in India, close to his family.
Anand knew his son worked in Manhattan but didn’t know the name of the building, he told a Yahoo reporter. He watched as United Airlines Flight 175 crashed into the South Tower and the towers fell, having no idea his son was one of the victims. The next year Anand and Kusuma finally made the trip to New York for the one-year anniversary of the attacks.
Hemanth also left behind a brother, Prashant, and sister, Seema.
In the town of Puttur, several monuments have been built honoring Hemanth, the hard-working young man whose future looked so bright before it was ripped from him on the other side of the world.
-By Andrew Vitelli
Richard Lasrado, a journalist, contributed original reporting for The White Plains Examiner from India. He was put in touch with The White Plains Examiner by www.mangalorean.com.
Adam has worked in the local news industry for the past two decades in Westchester County and the broader Hudson Valley. Read more from Adam’s author bio here.