Rajeev Motwani, Professor at Stanford University and the mentor of sites like Google and Paypal died of a freak accident in his home. His body was found in the swimming pool in his house in Palo Alto. A revered figure at the Stanford University, Raju Motwani has made immense contributions to the Silicon Valley through his teachings.

His was a dream success story. Raju Motwani studied in Jammu, India and graduated from IIT Kanpur. He later went on to complete his doctorate from the University of California-Berkeley in 1988. As a professor at Stanford University he was the mentor of the Google founders Sergei Brin and Larry Page.

Sergei Brin wrote “In addition to being a brilliant computer scientist, Rajeev was a very kind and amicable person and his door was always open. No matter what was going on with my life or work, I could always stop by his office for an interesting conversation and a friendly smile. Today, whenever you use a piece of technology, there is a good chance a little bit of Rajeev Motwani is behind it’’.

It is learned that Rajeev did not know how to swim and died of drowning. He is survived by his wife, Asha Jadeja, and daughters Naitri and Anya. His unfortunate death triggered a deluge of entries on social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, Orkut where his pupils opened out their hearts.