Telangana man Mubeen Ahmed shot in California, in critical condition

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NEW YORK – An Indian man, Mubeen Ahmed, 26, from Sangareddy district, Telangana, was in critical condition in hospital after being shot by an unidentified person in a department store California four days ago, according to family members in India, today.

The incident was said to have happened at 6 p.m. on June 4, though reports didn’t give the specific town or city in California where the crime took place.

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Ahmed had emigrated to the US in February, 2015 on an F-1 visa to pursue a graduate degree program in engineering, after completing his bachelor’s degree in electronics and communications engineering from the state’s Royal Institute of Technology and Science.

After completing his graduate degree program in California, he was working at a departmental store near California, said reports from India. Reports didn’t say which school in California he attended.

“On the day Mubeen was at the store when a few persons of Black-origin came in to make some purchase. There was some heated argument between the customers and Mubeen. Later, they fired at him resulting in a rupture in his stomach and damage to liver,” said the victim’s father Mujeeb Ahmed, to Sakshi news.

The victim’s uncle Mufti Aslam Osman said Mubeen was about to finish his duty at the store and return to his apartment in Fremont, when a few black persons stormed his place and demanded of him money and his mobile phone, reported The Hindustan Times.

“Apparently, an argument ensued between him and the miscreants when one of them opened fire at him, before fleeing the spot,” Osman told the Times. “He was immediately rushed to Eden Medical Centre in Castro Valley. The bullets pierced into his abdomen and liver,” he added.

Mubeen’s friends alerted a couple of his relatives in Chicago and they reached California to attend to him.

“He is said to be on a ventilator and his condition is critical,” Osman said.

Mubeen’s father Mujeeb Ahmed, who works at a military institution in Secunderabad, is making arrangements to leave for the US, said the Hindustan Times report.

The family brought the incident to the notice of Sangareddy MLA Chinta Prabhakar, who on his part alerted Telangana irrigation minister T Harish Rao to make visa arrangements for Mujeeb.

“Mujeeb would leave for the US after getting the visa in a day or two,” Osman said.

Meanwhile, Majlis Bachao Tehreek leader Amjedullah Khan has written to Union External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and Telangana NRI Affairs Minister KT Rama Rao to help Mubeen’s family, reported Scroll.

While the attack against Mubeen is being investigated and it’s too early to deem it as a hate crime, there have been a number of hate-motivated crimes against Indians and Indian Americans in the United States, in the recent past.

On February 22, an Indian software engineer, Srinivas Kuchibhotla, was killed when a Navy veteran opened fire at him and his friend at a pub in Kansas while yelling “get out of my country”.

Harnish Patel, a 43-year-old Indian-origin store owner, was found dead of gunshot wounds in the front yard of his home in South Carolina, in early March.