India clears last Mumbai siege site

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(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-12-02 07:50

MUMBAI -- As authorities finished removing bodies Monday from the bullet- and grenade-scarred Taj Mahal hotel, a Muslim graveyard refused to bury nine gunmen who terrorized this city over three days last week.

In Mumbai, security forces declared the landmark 565-room Taj Mahal hotel cleared of booby traps and bodies. The hotel was the scene of the final battle on Saturday morning.

"We were apprehensive about more bodies being found. But this is not likely - all rooms in the Taj have been opened and checked," said Maharashtra state government spokesman Bhushan Gagrani.

The army had already cleared other sites, including the five-star Oberoi hotel and the Mumbai headquarters of an ultra-Orthodox Jewish group.

Israeli emergency workers sorted through the shattered glass and splintered furniture at the Jewish center yesterday to gather the victims' body parts. At one point, one of the men opened a prayer book amid the rubble and stopped to pray.

A Muslim graveyard in Mumbai said yesterday it would not bury the dead gunmen, with an official saying they are not true followers of the Islamic faith.

"People who committed this heinous crime cannot be called Muslim," said Hanif Nalkhande, a trustee of the influential Jama Masjid Trust, which runs the 3-hectare Badakabrastan graveyard in downtown Mumbai. "Islam does not permit this sort of barbaric crime."

While some Muslim scholars disagreed with the decision - saying Islam requires a proper burial for every Muslim - the city's other Muslim graveyards are likely to go along because of the authority of the Jama Masjid trust.

Mumbai returned to normal yesterday to some degree, with parents dropping their children off at school and many shopkeepers opened their doors for the first time since the attacks began.

"I think this is the first Monday I am glad to be coming to work," said Donica Trivedi, 23, an employee of a public relations agency.

The attack revealed the weakness of India's security apparatus. India's top law enforcement official resigned Sunday, bowing to growing criticism that the attackers appeared better trained, better coordinated and better armed than police.

Maharashtra's top official, Vilasrao Deshmukh, offered to resign yesterday, as did his deputy, R.R. Patil, who had sparked outrage by referring to the attacks as "small incidents."