Shashi K. Shah, 90, was Merchant Marine Academy professor

Shashi K. Shah

Shashi K. Shah, a longtime New Canaan, Conn., resident and former professor at the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy, died at Stamford Hospital on June 21 after a long illness. He was 90.

Shah was born in Calcutta, India, and came to the U.S. in 1954 to study  chemical engineering. He enrolled at Brigham Young University and received a bachelor’s degree in 1957 and a master’s degree in 1959.

After arriving in New York City in the 1960s, he worked for a number of companies, including CBS, McGraw-Hill and Lever Brothers. He met Sumitra Shah at Columbia University, and the two were married in 1963.

In the 1970s, Shah became CEO and a director of Information Centers of America Inc., popularly known as “Tra-Vel.” He received an MBA from New York University in 1979, and his Ph.D. in business from the City University of New York in 1986. These degrees provided him the foundation to transition to academia. He taught at Rutgers University, St. John’s University, Hofstra University and Seton Hall University before the Merchant Marine Academy in Kings Point, N.Y.

His family said Shah was instrumental in helping modernize the academy’s teaching facilities. He also started an IT security program for the midshipmen and worked with the NSA and the U.S. Military Academy to raise funds to develop two IT security labs. Shah retired from the Academy as a full professor in December 2010. 

Shah was a business mentor at SCORE in Norwalk. Conn., and a member of the New Canaan Men’s Club. 

His wife predeceased him in 2014. He is survived by his son, Sanjit, (Mary) of South Salem, and two grandchildren.