Salman Rushdie stabbed '10 to 15 times' in neck: Eyewitness shares horrific details

Indian-born novelist Salman Rushdie was stabbed in the neck on Friday (August 12). The horrific incident occurred on stage at the Chautauqua Institution in New York state. The attacker rushed to the stage and stabbed the 75-year-old multiple times.

Police said that Rushdie was airlifted to a hospital. New York said that the novelist is alive and being treated at the hospital.

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Rabbi Charles Savenor, who was in the audience for the lecture at Chautauqua Institution, about 100 km from the city, said, "This guy ran onto platform and started pounding on Mr Rushdie."

Savenor told the news agency that "at first you're like, 'What's going on?' And then it became abundantly clear in a few seconds that he was being beaten." He said the attack lasted about 20 seconds.

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A reporter for the news agency The Associated Press, who was present at the scene, revealed horrific details. The reporter said that the attacker "punched or stabbed Mr Rushdie 10 to 15 times".

Reuters quoted a witness, who asked not to be named, as saying that the author fell to the floor when the man attacked him. After that, he was surrounded by a small group of people who held up his legs. It appeared that they wanted to send more blood to his upper body.

Rushdie's current situation is unknown but Andrew Wylie, who is a spokesperson for the novelist, said in an emailed statement that "Salman is in surgery." But Wylie did not give further details to share.

The motive behind the attack was not revealed and it was also not clear what kind of weapon was used.

Who is Salman Rushdie?

Salman Rushdie was born into a Muslim Kashmiri family in Bombay (now known as Mumbai) in 1947. He spent years hiding under death threats from Iran because of his writing. He moved to the United Kingdom.

Rushdie wrote the novel "The Satanic Verses" and faced death threats for it. Some Muslims said that his fourth novel "The Satanic Verses" contained blasphemous passages. The novel was banned in many countries with large Muslim populations upon its 1988 publication.

A year later, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, then supreme leader of Iran, pronounced a fatwa, calling upon Muslims to kill the novelist and anyone involved in its publication for blasphemy.

Even a bounty worth millions of dollars were raised to murder the novelist by some unknown Iranian organisations, some affiliated with the government.

The Iranian government said in 1998 that it would no longer back the fatwa, and Rushdie has lived relatively openly in recent years.

(With inputs from agencies)

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