A Chinese-American professor has filed a lawsuit against a university in Texas and mentioned the name of Dr. Hemang Desai because he favored only Indians while giving the position.
Chinese-American assistant professor Dr. Xun Wang has filed a lawsuit against Southern Methodist University in Texas for discrimination and favoring only Indians. The lawsuit was filed last year but has now come to light after it was reported by freelance journalist Chris Brunet.
In the lawsuit, Wang alleged that the university had a systemic problem of discrimination that led to him being denied his position in 2024 while three Indian professors got the same job in the accounting department.According to the lawsuit, the university told Wang that he was not a good fit and needed more citations and more exposure. He was called “out of shape” at least 13 times, but fellow Indian Saurabh Thomar received a positive review midway through his career from his department head, who is also Indian, the lawsuit said.Appointing Dr. Hemang Desai as president, the lawsuit said that Desai informed Wang on November 19, 2024 that there was a negative vote in the department (3-1) in which all three Indian faculty members voted against his tenure, citing failure to achieve outstanding performance, while the lone non-Indian faculty member voted in favor.
Wang said that from the beginning, Desai treated him differently and had higher expectations of him than his Indian colleagues.
“Since at least 2006, when Hemang Desai (of Indian origin) became a full professor at SMU’s Cox School of Business, the Department of Accounting has had a systematic pattern of discrimination in tenure decisions. Of the Indian-origin candidates who meet SMU’s stated productivity standard in at least four top-level postings, 100% (2 of 2) are tenured: Neel Bhattacharya in 2008 and Gauri Bhatt in 2020. Candidates of non-Indian origin (Caucasian and Chinese) who meet SMU’s stated productivity standard for at least four senior-level postings SMU has not supported any non-Indian candidates for a tenure-track position, including Mina Pizzini, Chris Hogan, Jing Pan, Jeff Yu,Dr. Wang. This pattern is consistent with ancestry-based preference for candidates of Indian descent and resentment toward non-Indian candidates, the lawsuit said.
“Indian faculty get main offices with beautiful views”
The lawsuit alleges that when offices were reallocated in the department’s new building in the spring of 2024, Indian faculty were given prime offices with nice views, while East Asian faculty were assigned to the “Chinese ghetto” down the hall.The university denied all allegations in its response filing and said Dr. Wang was not entitled to any compensation.
