Hyderabadi student brutally attacked by robbers in Chicago, wife seeks help of External Affairs Minister

HYDERABAD: A student from Hyderabad has been brutally injured when four armed robbers attacked him in Chicago.

Syed Mazahir Ali, pursuing Masters in Information Technology from Indiana Wesleyan University, was attacked and robbed by three men at Campbell Avenue near his residence on Sunday morning (local time).

Ali’s wife Syeda Ruquiya Fatima Razvi, who lives in Langar Houz, on Tuesday appealed to External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar to help in ensuring best medical treatment to him.

In a letter to the Minister, Syeda requested that arrangements be made for her travel to the US along with their three minor children. She said she received a call from her husband’s friend that he was attacked and robbed at Campbell Avenue when he was near his apartment. He was taken to a hospital.

Fatima said she got in touch with her husband after some time but he was in shock and was unable to talk to her. She wrote that she was worried about the safety of her husband.

A CCTV footage of the incident showed Ali walking on a road and three masked men chasing him. Another video clip showed the profusely bleeding victim narrating the incident.

With blood oozing out from his forehead, nose and mouth, he said he was returning home with a food packet when four men chased and attacked him. "I slipped near my house and they punched and kicked me and snatched my mobile phone," he said pleading for help.

Six Indian students dead in the US in a month

The incident in Chicago came to light in the wake of six Indian-origin students being found dead in the US during the last one month.

Last week, a student named Shreyas Reddy Beniger was found in Ohio. Authorities through ruled out any foul play or a possibility of a hate crime in the case.

Earlier in January, Neel Acharya, who went missing in the US, was confirmed dead by university authorities. A computer science and data science student at Purdue University in Indiana State, Acharya had been missing since January 28, according to a post on X by his mother Goury Acharya.

In the same month, Vivek Saini, a resident of Haryana, died after he was hammered 50 times in Georgia’s Lithonia on January 16. The 25-year-old was pursuing MBA and worked part-time at a convenience store that sheltered a homeless man Julian Faulkner. On January 16, the student refused to give Faulkner free food, which led to the attack. The assailant was later arrested.

A day earlier, another Indian student Akul Dhawan was found dead outside the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC). The autopsy of the 18-year-old suggested that he died from hypothermia. However, his parents have filed a complaint, accusing the university’s police department of negligence and inaction after Akul was reported missing.

Two other Indian students too were found dead under suspicious conditions at their Connecticut accommodation on January 15. G Dinesh (22) was from Wanaparthy and Nikesh (21) was from Srikakulam. The duo had gone to the US for higher education nearly a month ago. Their families did not know how the students, who were roommates, died. Dinesh’s kin was reportedly trying to seek help from the Union Government to begin an enquiry into the matter.