Kin ask: Why didn’t they just take his money?

IT WAS a workday like any other for Khalid Mehmood: Pack a lunch and grab his briefcase, out the door by 4:15 a.m. and off to the downtown subway.

And then his routine turned anything but — interrupted by a brutal pre-dawn Bronx beating and robbery. The Pakistani immigrant was nearly killed Wednesday for $6 in cash and a MetroCard, cops and his family said.

“He was ambushed,” said his devastated nephew Mohammad Ismail, 22. “My uncle is a very gentle, loving, caring, harmless person. Why would someone beat him that bad?

“Why didn’t they just take his money and walk away?”

Mehmood, 64, remained hospitalized Saturday after his cruel attacker left the Penn Station newsstand employee with a massive head wound, multiple facial fractures and bleeding on the brain.

The Bronx resident was initially placed on life support after a passerby found him bleeding and disoriented on the street minutes after the assault that happened during his three-minute stroll to the No. 6 train.

His wallet and briefcase were missing, along with his cash, his MetroCard and his typical bag lunch of two boiled eggs.

“Such a sweet person,” said Seema Qureshi, a Hudson Books employee who knows Mehmood. “I hope God gives him a long and healthy life. The whole (Penn) Station is praying for him.”

The attacker remained on the lam three days later. Police were hoping to find video of the beating to track down the suspect.

Mehmood, with a breathing tube in place, was still unable to speak and could answer questions only with a nod. He was able to provide his name to the ambulance drivers at the scene but recalled nothing of his attacker, according to Ismail.

The victim and his wife, Rukhsana, have been married 30 years. They moved to the Bronx in 1989 after he lost a job with the railroad. Mehmood took his job at Penn Station that same year.

Family members became worried when the reliable Mehmood never appeared at his job of 28 years and failed to come home at his usual time of 6 p.m.

Co-workers confirmed Mehmood never showed up, and then family members heard worshipers were praying at the mosque near their home for a man who was beaten early Wednesday.

The man turned out to be Mehmood, who still faces a difficult recovery to health.

“My uncle would say, if he could talk right now, that God saved him,” said Ismail.