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Attacks on two CEOs in a New Delhi suburb have raised concerns for multinational firms doing business in India.

At 12:30 p.m. local time Sept. 22, a mob of up to 200 former employees rushed Lalit Kishore Chaudhury, the CEO of an Italian-owned auto parts producer operating in the New Delhi suburb of Noida, and bludgeoned him to death at his company. The former employees had been laid off about two months before the attack and had frequently protested in front of the company, but in spite of this, it does not appear that any security measures were in place in case the situation escalated. The plant was closed for about a week after the killing, and it reopened Sept. 29 with an increased police presence but nevertheless nervous employees. Since the incident, 136 suspected instigators have been arrested.

Four days after the Chaudhury attack, at around 9:30 p.m. local time, Kashir Dwivedi, the CEO of a U.S.-owned software company, was dragged from his car on his way home from work in Noida and beaten over the head with an iron bar. It appears that the assailants might have been attempting to kidnap him, as Dwivedi told police that they were trying to force him into another car but he resisted long enough and attracted enough attention from onlookers to cause the assailants to give up. Dwivedi reported that he lost consciousness after being hit on the head and had to call his wife for help once he came to. Police said Sept. 30 that a plot including Dwivedi’s fired driver and a local business student had been hatched to kidnap the CEO for ransom money, which would then be used to finance the student’s election bid. A local organized crime gang was most likely used to carry out the abduction; the connections between organized crime and politics run deep in India.