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WORLD> Asia-Pacific
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India terror begins with corpses on train platform
(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-11-30 14:46 At about the same time, Leopold Cafe and Bar The place known as Leo's is one of the city's famous tourist restaurants, a joint crammed with glass-topped tables, old travel posters and lounging backpackers drinking cheap beer. There are maybe 100 people inside when two gunmen appear in the entrances. One lobs in a grenade. Then they open fire.
"It was total chaos ... People didn't know what was going on. Some hit the floor, some ran out of the side entrance or tried to find a place to hide," says Farzad Jehani, who owns the restaurant with his brother. The assault lasts, perhaps, two minutes. When it's over, at least four foreigners and three Indians are dead, though the brothers aren't sure because patrons quickly rush the casualties to hospitals in passing cars and taxis. By then the gunmen have left, jogging through the streets and apparently moving on to one of India's most famous hotels just a few blocks away. "They weren't aiming at anyone in particular. It was like they wanted to empty their magazines and do as much damage here as possible before heading to the Taj," Jehani says. About 9:45 p.m. Taj Mahal hotel No one believes it's gunfire. Not at the Taj. Built more than a century ago by one of India's most powerful business families, the castle-like Taj Mahal is the crossroads of the city's elite. It has been the scene of countless society weddings, business meetings and expensive dates. It is an icon of Mumbai.
But it is gunfire that two men are spraying across the ornate lobby, with its gray marble floor and Persian carpets the size of small swimming pools. Dalbir Bains, who runs a high-end Mumbai lingerie shop, is sitting down to a steak dinner by the pool with friends. They joke about hearing gunfire. Quickly, though, screams fill the hotel and her laughs turn to terror. She runs upstairs and huddles under a table in a restaurant with about 50 others, desperately trying to be quiet. "The gun shots were following us," says Bains. ---- 9:47 p.m., Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus The gunmen shoot toward a large glass-fronted restaurant. They are "firing at people waiting for the train. Luggage was spread everywhere. The place was full of blood. There were lots of people lying there dead," says manager Fongen Fernandes. Soon, though, everyone is dead or hiding. Except for corpses, the platforms are empty, d'Souza says.
The worst of the carnage appears to be in a waiting room for out-of-town trains. It was filled with dozens of bodies, many shot in the head. Overall, authorities say, 53 people are killed. Eventually, the gunmen steal a truck and drive away. A little later, one is killed by police and another, the only gunmen taken alive, is captured. He is Pakistani. At the station, authorities use wooden baggage carts to clear the corpses. Says Fernandes: "They collected them away like sheep and goats." |
