Blacksburg/Chennai/Mumbai/Kanpur, April 18 (IANS) From his village in Tamil Nadu to IIT Kanpur where he studied and from her former neighbourhood in Mumbai and all the way to the US, there was mass mourning Wednesday for an Indian professor and student who were among the 32 massacred in an American university by a South Korean student who later shot himself dead.

As flags flew half-mast across the US in memory of the victims of a senseless slaughter, Indians joined a stunned diapora in paying tributes to Professor G.V. Loganathan, 53, and architecture student Minal Panchal, 26, who fell victims to Monday's shooting spree by Cho Seung-Hui at the Virginia Tech University.

On Wednesday, Indian authorities moved quickly to issue passports to four members of Loganathan's grieving family to fly to the US, where the man who has been widely described as a "thorough gentleman" is to be cremated in line with his wish.

Simultaneously, Indian diplomats in the US announced that Minal, who moved to the US with a dream to become an architect like her late father and who had gone missing after the shooting, was indeed dead. Her body was found and identified, sending shock waves in the large Indian student community in the university.

Minal's body was discovered around 3 p.m. Eastern Standard Time Tuesday on the bloodstained campus. Indian diplomats said Minal's body would be handed over to her family "in two to three days".

Even a full two days after the horrific killings, the Virginia Tech University remained in a state of shock. Millions of Americans, including President George W. Bush, expressed their outrage over the shooting. At the same time, questions were raised about the rampant gun culture that has triggered one massacre after another in American schools and universities.

South Korea was particularly worried, its leaders saying they hoped the action of 23-year-old Cho would not lead to a backlash against the large Korean student population in the US.

And in India, the sadness over the cruel death of a professor who had made the Virginia University his home since 1977 and a young woman who combined brain and beauty was felt by tens of thousands - and many openly expressed their feelings on the web.

A scrapbook of Minal on Orkut elicited hundreds of condolence messages from not just her friends, classmates and acquaintances but also those who have never met or known her in the past.

One such message read: "I don't know u personally... not even seen u... but I would never want some thing this happening to anyone... May (your) soul rest in peace."

Both Minal, who was pursuing masters in building science, and Loganathan, who taught civil and environmental engineering, were in the Norris Hall when the shooting took place in the Blacksburg town university. He was teaching -- and she was listening to his lecture.

Neighours at Minal's fifth floor apartment in Mumbai's West's Park View residence in Borivili said Minal's widowed mother left for the US two weeks ago. Minal's elder married sister Kavita lives in New Jersey. Minal's father Hiralal, an architect, died some years back.

Minal passed out in 1996 from Mumbai's Our Lady of Remedy High School at Poinsur in Kandivili. After gaining a science degree, she studied at the Rizvi College of Architecture in Bandra.

An ardent fan of Ayn Rand's "The Fountainhead", her friends and former classmates described her as an intelligent and friendly girl who was thrilled to be with her sister - and in the US. The young woman was passionately in love with cricket - besides Indian and Chinese cuisine.

Said Neeta Bhivankar, Minal's childhood friend, told IANS: "She was a brilliant student and warm and friendly. She always wanted to excel academically and wanted to make it big in the field of architecture. I just can't believe Minal is no longer there."

At the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) in Kanpur, where Loganathan did his masters after shifting from Chennai, a condolence meeting was held on the campus Tuesday evening, IIT director Sanjay Dhande told IANS Wednesday.

The alumni association observed silence for two minutes. His contemporaries paid rich tributes to him.

Loganathan is survived by his homemaker wife Usha and two daughters - Uma is graduating in biomedical engineering from the University of Virginia and Abirami is a 7th grade student.

People close to Loganathan, who the university honoured as an excellent teacher, were all praise for him - both as an academic and a human being. Belonging to Karatadipalayam village in Tamil Nadu's Erode district, he was with the Virginia Tech University for two decades.

Vijayalakshmi Mallikarjunan, a network administrator at the university, said in a choked voice over telephone from the campus: "His killing is a big loss for us personally and for the Indian community here, which is now trying to give a hand to his family."

According to Surajit Kumar De Datta, also from Virginia, the university had around 450 students from India -- the highest from any country -- besides 30-odd Indian American faculty.

Karan Grewal, a 21-year-old Indian student and dormitory mate of the South Korean student who committed the slaughter said Cho Seung-Hui never looked sad or angry.

"I never really saw him with anyone," a shaken Grewal said. "I never took him to be a sad or angry guy, just shy." Cho, he said, often ate by himself in the dining hall, and he would turn his face away when others greeted him. "He never spoke a word," the Indian added.

Authorities said Cho used two handguns - a 9 mm one and a 22-calibre one - to commit the killings, and he apparently shot each victim thrice - before walking away looking for more victims. He had bought the weapons legally.

Though no suicide note has been found, investigators found a note in his dormitory in which he spoke out against "rich kids," "debauchery" and "deceitful charlatans" on campus.

Cho suspected his Taiwanese girlfriend of seeing another man and had a row with her in a co-ed dormitory in the sprawling campus. When a resident advisor came to resolve their, Cho shot him. He then shot the girl. And then he walked away only to gun down 30 more people who had nothing to do with him or his troubles. In the end, he killed himself.

Virginia Tech has cancelled all classes for the rest of the week. Norris Hall, where Loganathan and Panchal were among the killed, has been closed for the rest of the semester. 

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