ALL IN THE FAMILY

Usha Vance traces her roots to the Chilukuris, a family of educators who made immense contributions to shaping India's academia

-  RAHUL DEVULAPALLI

IN THE MID-1800S, four brothers of Vadluru village near Tanuku in present-day Andhra Pradesh began a long walk to Varanasi, India's spiritual capital. After mastering Hindu scriptures there, they returned home and began sharing their knowledge with the villagers. The brothers came to be known as 'Chilukuri Chatushtaya'-the four pillars of knowledge of the Chilukuri family.

"They were erudite and proficient in Sanskrit," says Chilukuri Shanthamma of Akkayapalem in Visakhapatnam. Shanthamma's husband, Chilukuri Subramanya Shastri, is a grandson of one of the 'Chathushtaya.'

At 96, Shanthamma looks spry even though she cannot move around without walking sticks. She jogs her memory when talking about her illustrious family, whose members include eminent teachers who have shaped India's academia. The family's latest newsmaker, though, is someone who is settled abroadUsha Vance, lawyer and wife of J.D. Vance, the Republican Party candidate for US vice president. Usha is a Chilukuri-she is the granddaughter of Shanthamma's husband's brother; her family had migrated to the US in the late 1970s.

Shanthamma's husband was a professor, as was her brother-in-law. Her father-in-law was the headmaster of a local school. Shanthamma specialised in spectroscopy and vedic mathematics, and claims she is the first woman to hold a PhD in physics in India. She is now professor emeritus at Centurion University at Vizianagaram, and has translated the Gita from Telugu to English and written five volumes on vedic mathematics.