A long way from Ohio and Washington, near the waters of the Bay of Bengal in south India, lives the last tenuous link with India for Usha Vance Chilukuri, wife of the Republican nominee for vice-president JD Vance.
Shanthamma Chilukuri, a 96-year-old physicist, is Usha’s great aunt, and one of many high achievers in a large family that proliferates with doctors, engineers, scientists, and professors. Chilukuri, a widow, lives frugally with a small family of helpers in Visakhapatnam, a port city in the state of Andhra Pradesh.
She is hard of hearing and uses two walking sticks following knee replacements. Yet Chilukuri still commutes to work at Centurion University in Vizianagaram, nearly 40 miles away by car, four times a week. “I have taught physics since 1956 and I loved teaching but I have reduced it slightly as I need more time to work on my research into atomic molecular spectroscopy,” she said.
In 1978, she received a Fulbright scholarship for research in spectroscopy of polyatomic molecules - or how matter absorbs or emits radiation. Her husband, Subramanya Sastry, had five brothers. Usha Vance, 38, is the granddaughter of one of these brothers, Rama Sastry.
Vance’s father, Chilukuri Radhakrishna, studied at the Indian Institute of Technology, one of India’s premier engineering colleges, before leaving for the US in the late 1970s with his wife, Lakshmi. They settled in San Diego where they teach engineering and molecular biology.
Chilukuri is one of the few relatives who remained in India.“I have not met Usha though I have visited America a few times. Her success does not surprise me. The whole family excels in academics. My husband too was top of his class at university,” she said. Apart from academia, Chilukuri’s family is rooted in Indian heritage.
Usha Vance was born and brought up in San Diego, USA. She received her BA degree in history from Yale University in 2007 and an MPhil from the University of Cambridge in 2009, where she was a Gates Cambridge Scholar. She has served on the board of the Gates Cambridge Alumni Association and as secretary of the board of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra.
Usha and Vance met at Yale Law School, where they developed a close relationship. The couple had two ceremonies for their wedding in 2014: a traditional wedding ceremony and a separate Hindu ceremony conducted by a Hindu priest, honoring Usha’s Hindu heritage. They have three
children: Ewan, 6, Vivek, 4, and Mirabel, 2
In an interview with Fox News, Vance explained how his Indian-origin wife’s Hindu faith had been instrumental in helping him navigate challenges and reconcile his Catholic beliefs. He revealed that he was raised Christian but never baptized until 2018. “Usha was actually raised non-Christian.
But I remember when I started to re-engage with my faith, Usha was very supportive,” Vance said.
Usha has made rare appearances alongside her husband during his campaign for the Ohio Senate election in 2022.
