An Indian software engineer from Andhra Pradesh working with fraud-hit Satyam Computers was shot dead by unidentified assailants in Arkansas.
An Indian software engineer from Andhra Pradesh working with fraud-hit Satyam Computers was shot dead by unidentified assailants in Arkansas in the US in the seventh case of young students and professionals from the state being killed in the last 14 months.
N Akshay Vishal(26) was shot in his legs in Little Rock, Arkansas in the early hours of Tuesday, said his father Lakshmana Murthy, a BSNL employee and a resident of Begumpet.
A pall of gloom descended at the home of the Murthy family which was celebrating the Makar Sankranti festival after the news of the tragedy broke.
Vishal sustained multiple injuries in the attack by suspected Afro-American men and was operated upon in a hospital in Little Rock but succumbed to injuries, he said.
"He was near his home when somebody perhaps demanded some money. He was fired at and bullets hit him in the leg. Due to this, his arteries bled profusely which led to kidney failure. We were informed on Tuesday morning that his condition was critical. Subsequently, the news of his death came on Wednesday," Murthy said.
Vishal's friends admitted him to the hospital and informed the family about the incident, Murthy said, adding that the engineer had gone to the US in 2005.
Vishal's body is likely to be brought to India in a week after all formalities are completed, he said.
In a string of tragedies revolving around people hailing from AP being victims, Arpana B Jinaga, an IT engineer in Seattle was found dead under mysterious circumstances in her apartment on November 3. An engineering student in Southern Illinois University T Soumya Reddy was found murdered in September last. Her cousin Vikram Reddy, also a software engineer in Chicago, was also found dead nearby.
A Srinivas, a post-graduate medical student was found murdered in Pennsylvania in March while A Kirankumar and K Chandrasekhar Reddy, both PhD students, were shot dead at Louisiana University in December 2007.
On November 16 last, Pulluri Shashank, a native of Warangal in AP, survived a violent attack by unidentified miscreants in Tennesse.
Murthy said he sought the cooperation of State Energy minister Mohammed Ali Shabbir, who looks after issues related to Non-Resident Telugus, and was assured of all possible help.
Vishal completed his engineering from Chaitanya Bharati Institute of Technology here and left for the US in 2005, family sources said. Vishal did his MS in America and joined Satyam Computers, they said. He was working for Falcon Jet Airways, a client of Satyam Computers.
Meanwhile, BJP leader C Vidyasagar Rao alleged that the governments at the Centre and state have not taken any concrete steps to prevent the killings of Indian professionals in the US.
"Our government is helping parents to bring back the bodies who were killed in America. But they are not doing anything to prevent such incidents," state BJP president B Dattatreya said.
Read: Spate of killings binds Indian students in US
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