HYDERABAD, April 30: The family of an Indian engineer kidnapped and beheaded by Taliban militants in southern Afghanistan were shocked and inconsolable on Sunday. K. Suryanarayana, 41, was working as a contractor for Afghan mobile telephone network Roshan. His headless body was found on Sunday two days after he was seized by Taliban militants.

Suryanarayana’s wife Manjula and his two daughters and one son — who live in a middle-class locality on the outskirts of this southern city — were shattered by the news.

Wails of grief were heard at their home as television channels first flashed unconfirmed reports of his death.

Manjula and her ailing mother-in-law fainted on receiving confirmation from the Indian government that Suryanarayana had been killed, said an AFP reporter who visited the bereaved family.

Shocked family members, friends and relatives later called in doctors to examine Manjula as others tried in vain to console the engineer’s three children — 14-year-old Anisha, nine-year-old Manisha and five-year-old son Satya Teja.

Suryanarayana is the second Indian to be abducted and murdered by the Taliban in Afghanistan in the past six months. In November a driver working on a road construction project in Nimroz province was also murdered.

Suryanarayana was abducted on Friday in Zabul province on the highway linking Kabul to the southern city of Kandahar. His body was found in the province’s Shahjoy district.

On Saturday the militants had threatened to kill Suryanarayana unless all Indian nationals and companies left Afghanistan within 24 hours.

India’s President Abdul Kalam and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh described the killing as “inhuman”.

A grim-faced Foreign Secretary Shyam Saran said the murder had been a “premeditated act” and committed even before negotiators landed in Kabul to discuss his release.

“The government of India is appalled by this dastardly and inhuman act of terror on the part of the Taliban and their sponsors, which has resulted in the tragic and untimely death of an innocent Indian citizen,” Saran told reporters.

Describing the Taliban as a “terrorist organisation” Saran urged “the international community to recognize its true face and join hands together to defeat this scourge to humanity.”

Saran said New Delhi had taken several steps in the past few months to increase security for about 1,300 Indians working on government-aided projects in Afghanistan.

Another foreign ministry official, who did not wish to be named, said Suryanarayana’s body would be brought to New Delhi on Monday and taken to Hyderabad.—AFP