Umesh Chandra Gupta

Umesh Chandra Gupta departed this earth on July 8, 2025, in Jackson, MS, nearby Clinton, MS, where he lived with his wife Manju in his dream home that he designed himself since August 1983. For most of his life, he served as the humble, loyal, pure, and principled patriarch of the Gupta family worldwide. And his surviving family believes that it was his never-ending acts of selfless giving to his family and to the community for which he would have liked to have been remembered most.
Umesh was born into post-WWII India, in Deesa, Gujrat, on October 31, 1947. He was the eldest of four sons of Ram Swaroop Gupta and his wife Narayani Devi Gupta. He lived, as an adolescent, with one of his paternal uncles in Jodhpur, Rajasthan. There, some of his daily responsibilities were to make everyone's bed in the household, followed by fetching the water from the main well in the city, and then finishing by cooking breakfast (again, for everyone). Because he was precocious very early in his life, the family saved enough money to rent a small room with a table, chair, and lightbulb by which he would study long into the night.
Umesh's efforts paid off, granting him entry into the extraordinarily prestigious India Institute of Technology in Kharagpur, graduating with a bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering with "First Class Honours" in 1969. His father then sent his young son, with limited financial resources and on a one-way ticket, to the University of Waterloo in Canada. It was here that he studied for a master's degree in Electronics under a full scholarship, graduating in 1972, while also supporting his family abroad by delivering pizza and selling fire alarms door-to-door.
In a true old-school love story, Umesh first met his soulmate and the woman he would eventually marry, Manju Agarwal, in 1969 in Mumbai, India. While he adored her from afar for several years, he could not convince her mother to let her marry him and go to Canada until 1973, the year in which they were ultimately married in Lucknow, India before travelling. (Before leaving Lucknow, Manju even completed her own master's degree in Sanskrit at Lucknow University!)
In 1973, Umesh first started working as a Floor Technician at Electrohome Limited, a company whose portfolio included developing early color televisions and service replacement motors. Eventually, he became their Head of the Floor Technicians. In 1978, after the birth of his first son, Ankur, he moved the family from Kitchener, Ontario to Long Island, NY to work at PMI Motors as a Product Engineering Group Leader. His younger son, Parag, arrived to compete the family in 1980. Subsequently, he moved the family one last time for an incredible opportunity in Jackson, MS at Vickers, Inc. There, he worked in the research and development area of the company as an Electrical Engineer, heavily involved in the hydraulic fuel pump design and testing of the Comanche helicopter, a topic upon which he held several U.S. Patents. After an early formal retirement in 1995, he continued to consult at Vickers and also for a childhood friend's company, Anvik Corporation, where he also holds U.S. Patents in the general field of laser lithography and microlithography.
Umesh was a huge advocate for education and for the support of those pursuing their educational dreams who could not afford to do so. For his elder son, Ankur, Umesh saw him through his high school years at Clinton High School (CHS) where he was a 1996 graduate and its Salutatorian, onwards to the University of Texas at Dallas, and then to Duke University for his Ph.D. in Computer Science. For his younger son, Parag, he similarly saw him through his high school years at CHS where he was a 1998 graduate and its Valedictorian, onwards to Vanderbilt University, and then to Northwestern University for his Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering.
The family mentions these educational accomplishments because Umesh never tired of (embarrassingly) discussing his sons and their educational pathways any time he could find anyone who would listen to him. And he did so with immense pride, excitement, and emotion every time. We therefore felt it was a lasting tribute to his memory to capture these accolades here in perpetuity on his behalf. Until he passed, he was also supporting the education of hundreds of others too, donating substantively to a school for less fortunate students nearby his alma mater in Kharagpur.
Umesh is (locally) survived by his loving wife of nearly 52 years, Manju; his elder son, Ankur, his wife, Diksha, and their daughter, Deeya (who is as precocious as he was!); and his younger son, Parag. We will never forget our beloved Papa's kind nature, his willingness to help anybody (literally), and his master craftmanship as an engineer and inventor. He truly was a remarkable gem of a person, a lover of philosophy, a man of supreme and unwavering principles, a poet in his own way, and a gentle soul above all else. May he now rest in blissful peace after a long life, fully lived for others.
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