The Siege: 68 Hours Inside the Taj Hotel (22 page)

The
Al-Hussaini
crew slaughtered the rest of the Indian fishing party and threw their bodies over the side, before turning back towards Karachi.

Aboard the MV
Kuber
, the
fidayeen
were finally alone. All of them sat on deck, grim-faced, as for the first time heavy waves reared up and slapped the deck. Brother Ismail knew what to do. He switched on his satellite phone and listened to the static.
‘Salaam Alaikum?’
he tried, his voice breaking up as his nerves got the better of him. They all waited, afraid of the phone. Had they been abandoned?

Then a voice:
‘Walaikum assalam.’

They cheered. It was the familiar tone of Abu Hamza, the Indian
mujahid
, replying from the Karachi control room at Malir Town. They had not been abandoned, even if they were pitching and yawing. For the next thirty-two hours they sailed, feeling more optimistic, bearing south-south-east for 309 nautical miles, forcing Solanki to check his boat’s course, keeping the control room up to date with their progress. The team took it in turns to stand guard, cook and sleep, writing their duty times in a ruled schoolbook.

At 4 p.m. on 26 November, their confidence ebbed when they spotted the coastline of India. Soon after, recalled Ajmal, ‘We started seeing the tall buildings of Bombay.’ Stunned, they stood on deck and stared. By 6 p.m., they could see before them all the evidence that a person who had never left Pakistan needed of the riches gleaned from near-stability and partial secularism, a vista of palms, towers and villas, strung with lights, of hotels and offices blazing with neon.

‘Make it burn. Set it all alight, my brothers,’ Al-Qama had said, as the dinghies left the creek in Karachi. Did he worry that they might waver upon arrival, preferring to abscond, and disappear in successful, mercantile Mumbai? ‘What should we do with the Indian captain?’ Ajmal asked, snapping everyone out of their reverie, and not wanting to decide on his own.

Ismail got on the phone to Abu Hamza in Karachi control. ‘Do whatever you want,’ the Indian
mujahid
said, urging them to make the decision. Ajmal looked at Ismail: ‘Kill him?’ he whispered, shaking. Ismail nodded. Shoaib and Umer held Solanki’s legs while Ajmal closed his eyes, scrunching his face up, clutching the man’s hair, before cutting his throat, concealing the horror that overcame him.

They had stepped over a threshold. All of them were blooded.

Above deck, the yellow inflatable was prepared. Before lowering it into the sea, they prayed, and changed into their new clothes. Ismail handed out the ID cards and red Hindu threads that Headley had bought at Mumbai’s Shree Siddhivinayak Ganapati Mandir, a
multi-storey cream-coloured Ganesha temple, popular with Bollywood stars.

The few signs that pointed to Pakistan as their homeland had been shorn and they had been turned into faceless martyrs in a conscious process of attenuation that saw their willpower and self-image whittled away, until they felt grateful for being sent to their deaths. Looking at the others, their hair slicked down with almond oil, Ajmal recalled being briefly unable to tell them apart. They could be anyone among one billion people, he thought. They were no one.

Above the roar of the Yamaha engine, Brother Ismail held a GPS aloft, like the boat’s figurehead, guiding them to the darkened huts of Badhwar Park and the fishermen’s colony that David Headley had earmarked as the perfect landing spot.

‘Let’s not bring disgrace upon us all,’ Ismail shouted before the engines were cut, and the boat glided between the fishing boats, nudging up to the shore.

Ahead Ajmal could hear muffled voices, and inhaled the smell of frying fish and fenugreek that made their stomachs growl. They allowed their eyes to grow accustomed to the gloaming, their ears attuning to the foreign accents. A TV was blaring, tuned in to the India-England cricket match. In the shacks ahead, a boisterous crowd of drinkers had gathered, their silhouettes weaving and swaying.

As he leapt ashore, Ajmal recalled
chacha
Zaki’s parting blessing: ‘May Allah make true everything you wish for in your heart.’ He raced up the slip and into the city, heart pumping, tears in his eyes.

An hour later, David Headley received an SMS. With M1 (Shazia) ensconced in Chicago, he was back with M2 (Faiza) in a rented apartment in Lahore. ‘Turn on your TV.’ The sender was Sajid Mir. A second text bleeped soon after, from M1 herself. Shazia was watching television, too, and she congratulated her husband on ‘the graduation’.

5.

Lambs and Chickens

Wednesday, 26 November 2008, 11.30 p.m. – the Taj

A legion of camera crews from all over the subcontinent swirled around the Taj, reporters, anchors and their producers pooling in the lanes around its perimeter, their kitbags spilling and cables coiling. ‘The city that never sleeps has been brought to its knees this Wednesday night by unprecedented multiple terror attack, bringing areas from the south to the north of the metropolis under its grip,’ a
CNN–IBN
reporter bellowed, in the manner of Dashiell Hammett. Everyone was shouting to be heard, illuminating the night sky with their floodlights, leaching into each other’s sightlines.

From his eyrie in the Rendezvous Room at the top of the Tower, the Marine captain, Ravi Dharnidharka, looked down over the scene in dismay. Why had no one locked down the perimeter? It all seemed out of control. The only thing that was missing was the most important thing of all: where were the blinking lights from the rescue vehicles? Bob Nicholls, an old hand in Mumbai who had had many dealings with the security establishment, feared that the response, when it came, would be too little, too late. ‘We’re going to have to look after ourselves,’ he warned.

Down below, on the third floor of the Palace, Will and Kelly sat holding one another, listening out for the sounds of commandos clattering in to save them. ‘That’s what happens, right?’ Will asked.

One and a half miles away, Commissioner Gafoor sat outside the Trident–Oberoi in his staff car, playing it by the book, which required him to lead from a secure position out in the field. But he and his
front-line forces remained invisible to the besieged citizens of a terrified city and its guests. The specialist Quick Response Teams had finally made it downtown, only to be assigned to marshal the press, although they were so outnumbered that they hung back, listless and demoralized. Small units of police and soldiers aimlessly circled the hotel, like pedalos in a park, following Gafoor’s instruction not to take on the gunmen inside the besieged buildings. They were to stand down until the National Security Guard (NSG), India’s elite counter-terrorism force, arrived – Rakesh Maria had called for it almost immediately. ‘Let the correct agency handle it,’ the Commissioner argued, paralysing the whole emergency response network.

What no one in Mumbai realized was that the NSG was still penned in its barracks near Delhi, a three-hour flight away, and could only be mobilized when the Maharashtra government requested help. Yet state officials were still not ready to admit they were overwhelmed. The MARCOS, India’s equivalent of the UK’s Special Boat Service or the US Navy SEALs, were more accessible, with some men stationed down the road in Colaba. They could literally have jogged to the Taj. But they also required Maharashtra to make a formal call to the Western Naval Command. There, officers already had reservations, making it clear in high-level secret discussions that the MARCOS were ‘the wrong dog for the fight’. Trained in anti-piracy actions, these Marines were happy on a Halo drop into a heaving sea, strapped into their 30kg kit, each with a crossbow across his back to silently knock out sentries on a ship’s deck. But a five-star hotel was unknown territory.

It was more than two hours since the gunmen had entered the Taj, and so far only six policemen had followed them in, led by Vishwas Patil, the Deputy Commissioner of Police of Zone 1.

Inside, Patil, Rajvardhan – the chief of SB2 – and their small team were still flummoxed by the hotel’s complex layout, while the gunmen seemed to have a far superior understanding of it and were using it to their advantage, playing hit-and-run among the 567 guest rooms. Recently the Black Suits had come up with an idea to
narrow the odds, suggesting that the hotel’s CCTV room, on the Palace’s second floor, could afford a bird’s-eye view.

Patil consulted Rajvardhan, who, in the last half-hour, had locked down the hotel’s exits, immobilizing its lifts, and evacuated hundreds of guests hiding in ground floor shops and restaurants. He was ready for the hunt but warned they would need a guide to get up there. The Black Suit Puru Petwal, who had helped evacuate the Tower lobby, volunteered.

Petwal and the police party gingerly crossed into the Palace lobby, and almost immediately an ear-splitting blast knocked them off their feet. The gunmen were at the top of the Grand Staircase, hurling down grenades. Rolling clear, Petwal suggested an alternative route, leading the shaken team up a fire exit. Rajvardhan was cursing. Petwal was armed only with his mobile phone. No one had body armour or helmets. The police team of constables and inspectors had about fifty rounds between them. The two DCPs only had side arms, which were practically useless unless there was close-quarters fighting. They faced men with a full complement of firepower.

‘The only person you can reliably kill with a high-power 9mm is yourself,’ Rajvardhan whispered to his batch-mate, recalling the old training mantra about drawing your pistol, as they loped along the second floor of the south wing, passing the Taj Data Centre.

Inside, Florence Martis was agitated. Faustine had finally got through to her at 10 p.m. and had tried to break it to her gently. ‘Don’t get scared,’ he said, ‘but gunmen are inside the building. You should hide.’ Faustine tried to steady his daughter: ‘The Data Centre is not on the hotel map. No outsider can know it’s there. I will come for you. Do you hear?’

But Florence
was
scared. She felt like a shaken bottle of cola. She frantically looked around: desks along three walls, half a dozen chairs, a small number of terminals and a printer, a couple of ancient upright fans. There was a small stationery room, where they hung their jackets, and the server room. She entered the latter,
and her phone rang. ‘Hello?’ It was Precilla, her mother. ‘Where
are
you?’ she asked. ‘Mum, I’m trapped in my office.’ Florence felt tears welling, imagining being curled up on the sofa in her mother’s arms. But right now she needed inspiration and not consolation.

Florence scrabbled for a calming thought, settling on Faustine on a Sunday, the only time all of them were together. He was steaming
idli
(savoury rice cakes), with mutton stewing on the back ring. Later, they would go to Mass at St Lawrence’s, where they always sat on the same bench. She imagined walking in with her father to greet the congregation.

She turned off the lights, locked the door and sat in the dark, praying for her father to come. Suddenly all the phones started ringing. Was it the gunmen, hunting for hostages? She left the server room and went into the storeroom, hiding behind the coats. But it felt too claustrophobic.

There was smashing and splintering. She covered her ears. Someone close by was breaking down a door. Was she imagining this or was it real? Shots rang out below, possibly beside the pool. The smashing stopped and she could hear talking. The voices were in an unfamiliar language. Then there was screaming, gunshots and footsteps.

‘Dear Lord,’ she prayed, ‘please save me. We have always prayed to you.’

One floor above the Data Centre, to the left of the Grand Staircase, and in room 316, Will and Kelly also heard desperate cries and then gunshots. It felt as if the bullets were drilling through the walls. Will got on his hands and knees, hunting for his mobile phone. He recovered it from a pile of clothes beside the bed. Hands trembling, he punched in his father’s number. It was early evening back in England, and Nigel Pike was at home. After Will’s mother had died from cancer five years previously, Will and his siblings had rallied round their father, bringing them closer together.

‘Dad, we’re in a situation,’ Will whispered. ‘The hotel is being attacked. It might be terrorists. We need help.’ Nigel could hardly
hear his son but caught the gist of it. ‘Sit tight and keep your phones switched on,’ he said, trying to keep the horror out of his voice. A dad was supposed to solve problems and yet he felt engulfed by this one. ‘I’ll make some calls.’ He put down the phone and lit a cigarette. Will and Kelly were almost 4,500 miles away. What could he do to help?

Back in the Taj, someone knocked on a nearby door. Will and Kelly lay still in the dark, blood rushing to their heads. ‘Answer? Don’t answer?’ Footsteps moved along the corridor. They could hear knocking at another door. Kelly lay down on the carpet, covering her ears, her heart thumping so loud she was sure Will could hear it. Will got up and crept over to the door to peek through the spyhole. ‘Let’s call reception,’ whispered Kelly. ‘They’ll know what to do.’ The call connected to the hotel’s automated answering system. ‘Fuck.’ A dawning realization hit them both. No one was down there. ‘Leave a message,’ said Kelly, clutching at straws. ‘Tell them we are stuck.’ Dear Hotel, we are prisoners on the third floor. It felt ridiculous and, anyhow, Will did not understand the menu choices. He could not work out if he was still stoned or was addled by fear.

‘We need to keep busy,’ he said, as he began tearing the room apart, scouring it for hiding places. Kelly joined in, searching for vents in the ceiling, or cavities in the walls, both of them thinking how it was done in films. What tricks were they missing? It sounded stupid, but what would MacGyver do? He had loved the ingenious TV secret agent whose show he had watched obsessively as a child, transfixed by how McGyver had deployed his scientific know-how and his Swiss army penknife to get out of any fix. ‘What about the cleaning cupboard?’ he suggested, remembering an unmarked door he had spotted on their dash back from the staircase. ‘Too exposed,’ Kelly said, ruling it out. At least in this room they could try and get the windows open – if it came to that.