In yet another attack on an Indian in Australia, a 31-year old cookery student was viciously stabbed in the stomach by two men after he finished work in a South Yarra bar early in November.
The student who did not want to be named underwent an emergency surgery and had a 26-stitches on his punctured bowel after the attack on November 5, AAP reported on Monday.
He said the two men approached him in lovers walk South around 11.10pm as he walked to a railway station. They asked him for money, and when he said he had none, he was punched and assaulted.
"One punched me in the stomach, scolded me and said dirty words. I collected some courage and ran away."
"It wasn't until he reached south yarra rail station that he realised he was bleeding and that he'd been stabbed. He hailed a taxi, which took him to the alfred hospital where he was operated on immediately.
The victim, who has been in Australia for two years, spent the next 10 days in hospital, and only then did he let his parents in India know what had happened.
Victoria police is now appealing for witnesses to the attack to come forward.
"It was a very callous attack, and we want these two men off the streets," according to a senior police official Emma Frankcom.
She said the attack did not appear to be racially motivated.
"It appears to be a random attack," she said.
Over 100 incidents of attacks on Indians, including racial, have come to light since May last year in Australia. 21-year-old student Nitin Garg, who was stabbed to death here, was the first victim of such assaults in 2010.