By Vipin Nair and Stephen Foxwell
Nov. 29 (Bloomberg) -- Indian forces combed the luxury Taj Mahal hotel in Mumbai looking for survivors of the nation’s deadliest terrorist attack in at least 15 years after commandos killed the remaining militants to end a 60-hour siege.
At least 195 people died in the attacks on the Taj Mahal Palace and Tower and Oberoi-Trident hotels, a Jewish center, railway station and restaurant, S Jadhav, an official at the city’s disaster management unit said. “We expect the number to rise as we hear there are bodies inside the Taj,” he said. Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh said nine militants were killed.
The ground floor of the 565-room Taj Mahal hotel was flooded and strewn with debris after militants fought gun and grenade battles with special forces for three days. The terrorists held out because they knew the layout of the century-old heritage hotel and were well trained in the use of explosives and guns, authorities said. Indian Hotels Co. Managing Director Raymond Bickson denied a Zee News report one of the attackers had worked as a chef in the hotel.
“We have had no indications that any employees or contractual staff of the hotel have been involved as part of this terrorist attack as is being reported by some media outlets,” Bickson said in a statement.
Death Toll
More than 295 people were injured in the attacks. Most of those who died were Indians and a final death toll hasn’t been officially released. Six Americans died, U.S. Ambassador to India David Mulford said in New Delhi. More U.S. citizens are missing.
Two rabbis from New York were among five hostages and two attackers died at the Jewish Chabad-Lubavitch Center in Mumbai which was stormed by Indian commandos.
Three Germans, one Japanese, two Canadians and a Briton were killed, chief minister Deshmukh said. Two Australians died and more may have been killed, Foreign Minister Stephen Smith said earlier. Thirty-six Australians were unaccounted for, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said late yesterday. Two French nationals died, President Nicolas Sarkozy said.
“I have told the Indian prime minister that the French security service would collaborate with all its strength to help this great democracy face this crazy, groundless, barbarian terrorism that killed many innocent people,” Sarkozy told reporters in Doha on the sidelines of a UN conference. “No cause can make this acceptable, none, ever. It’s barbarism.”
Shift in Tactics
The targeting of Westerners marks a shift in tactics for Islamic militants in India as they strike the international links that have helped the country’s economy grow at 9 percent or more for each of the past three years. Elements in Pakistan are responsible for the attacks, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said.
One terrorist arrested on Nov. 26, the first night of the attacks, said the group had planned to blow up the Taj Mahal hotel, Times Now reported. A favorite place for weddings and business meetings, the property has accommodated the likes of Mick Jagger, Jacqueline Onassis, Yehudi Menuhin and Prince Charles, according to Tata Group’s Web site.
“Unlike any similar event of the past, it’s the fear that has affected most people in the city,” said Dr. Geeta Balakrishnan, a director at the College of Social Work in Mumbai, where about a hundred of students along with faculty members were counseling the injured. “They have exposed our vulnerability. They targeted the city’s rich and influential.”
Searching Rooms
The National Security Guard wasn’t declaring an end to the crisis until all rooms at the Taj Mahal hotel were searched, J.K. Dutt, director general of NSG commando unit, said at a briefing, adding some guests may still be in the complex. Three blasts were heard inside the hotel after the NSG said in a public announcement it would set off controlled explosions. Authorities deployed 350 of the elite NSG, Chief Minister Deshmukh said.
Television images showed commandos exchanging gunfire with one of the remaining terrorists just after daybreak before bundling his body out of a hotel window.
Busloads of commandos moved in to the Taj to do a room-by- room search after gunshots and blasts that had rocked the building in the early hours of today subsided.
The main entrances of both the Oberoi and Trident hotels were sealed with wooden planks. Glass windows of the first-floor Kandhar restaurant were peppered with bullet holes, while the 10 foot-high glass partitions in the lobby were shattered.
Twenty-four hours after the siege ended, police and Rapid Action Force personnel were planning to hand over the hotel to its management after re-checking rooms for explosives.
Trident Hotel
Suryakant Mahadik, a deputy leader of the Shiv Sena political party, which has the hotel employees union under its affiliation, said he expects the Trident hotel to open within a week. “The Oberoi will take longer,” he said.
“The terrorists tried to create unrest since there’s no other apparent motive,” Mahadik said. “About 500 employees were present at the two hotels on the fateful evening, about 10-12 employees were killed.”
The attack is the deadliest in India since bomb blasts rocked Mumbai’s commercial landmarks, including the Bombay Stock Exchange building, killing more than 250 people in 1993.
The 1993 blasts were blamed by the police on members of the Mumbai underworld, belonging to Dawood Ibrahim’s gang. India says Ibrahim is hiding in Pakistan, a charge the neighboring country denies.
A little-known Islamist group, the Deccan Mujahedeen, claimed responsibility for the shootings and explosions across the western coastal city, Indian Home Ministry official M.L. Kumawat said.
Attack Planned Six Months Ago
The attackers began planning their assaults six months ago, India’s NDTV reported, citing an account from a captured terrorist. A seized global positioning system showed some of the group left Karachi, Pakistan, as early as Nov. 12, NDTV said.
The group had reached India’s financial hub in three speedboats from Gujarat after arriving in one boat from Karachi, the Mumbai Mirror reported.
The militants broke into groups and four went to the Taj Mahal Palace and Tower Hotel while three groups of two people each went to the Oberoi-Trident hotel complex, a railroad station and a Jewish center, the report said, citing confessions made by the only terrorist arrested by the Indian authorities.
Lashkar-i-Taiba or Jaish-i-Muhammad, two Muslim extremist terrorist groups from Pakistan that have attacked India in the past, may be involved, MSNBC reported on its Web site, citing unidentified analysts and counterterrorism officials. The groups are linked to violence in Kashmir, a region over which India and Pakistan have fought.
‘Highly Motivated Terrorists’
“We came up against highly motivated terrorists,” Vice- Admiral J.S. Bedi, whose commandos led the assault against the militants, said in televised comments. He showed pictures of hand grenades, tear-gas shells and AK-47 ammunition recovered in the battle.
Multiple attacks have hit cities in India, which is mostly Hindu, with bombs planted in markets, theaters and near mosques this year, leaving more than 300 people dead.
India will “go after” individuals and organizations behind the attacks, which were “well-planned with external linkages,” Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said in a televised address, without identifying nations.
Pakistan’s government turned down India’s request to send the chief of the military intelligence agency to investigate the Mumbai terror attacks.
Officials of Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence, or ISI, will instead be sent to India, Zahid Bashir, the Pakistani premier’s press secretary, said in a telephone interview from the capital Islamabad.
Zardari’s Fears
Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari said earlier he will send the intelligence head to India for the first time to counter claims that the attackers are linked to his country.
Pakistan’s “government will cooperate with India in exposing and apprehending the culprits and the masterminds behind” the Mumbai terrorist attacks, according to a statement by the president’s office, citing Zardari’s phone conversation yesterday with Singh.
The attacks in Mumbai show a militant movement among Indian- born followers of Islam is aligning its campaign with those from majority-Muslim countries, while seeking to hit economic interests, B. Raman, the former counterterrorism director of India’s intelligence agency, said in a telephone interview yesterday.
To contact the reporters on this story: Vipin V. Nair in Mumbai at vnair12@bloomberg.net; Stephen Foxwell in Mumbai at sfoxwell@bloomberg.net.
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