A massacre in Mumbai didn’t kill India’s spirit

MUMBAI, India – If the cowardly Pakistani terrorists who blasted their way into the lobby and the towers of the iconic Taj Mahal hotel last year, firing machine guns and tossing hand grenades at guests, and into the rooms of a hotel that had been built by an Indian 105 years because the British barred him from one of theirs, thought they were striking a blow at the people of this country and city, they’re in for a bigger surprise than if they think there’s virgins in hell, where they went after security forces gunned down all but one of them.
They killed 19 staff and 12 guests in the luxury hotel, including the wife and children of the general manager, who were trapped in their room behind a wall of fire while the trigger-happy lunatics blazed away in the halls, taking orders on cell phones from their leader in Pakistan, who was out of the line of fire.
The 2008 attacks were more than 10 coordinated shooting and bombing attacks across Mumbai, India’s financial capital and its largest city. The attacks, which drew widespread condemnation across the world, began on Nov. 26 and lasted three days, killing 173 people and wounding 308.
In the Taj Mahal Palace and Towers hotel, the names of the victims are emblazoned on a stately and dignified waterfall memorial outside the window of the lobby, where last week guests went about their business and the city held its celebration of the Diwali Festival, although the sound of constant fireworks outside the doors was an eerie reminder of last year. What you saw inside the hotel – and across a city that wouldn’t be cowed – was people scoffing their noses at terrorists and continuing to live while remembering those who didn’t.
“Bombay is a very resilient city. We don’t hide behind closed doors,” explained Nikhila Palat, the 27-year-old public relations manager for the hotel, a woman as cool and confident as the people of the city. The terror almost struck home for the European Union that horrible night because members of the European Parliament Committee on International Trade were staying in the hotel, but none were injured. They included MEP Sajjad Karim of the United Kingdom, who was in the lobby when the attackers opened fire. “I ran into the kitchen and we were shunted into a restaurant in the basement. I saw a man in front of me with a machine gun wanting to kill me. I saw the people in front of me start to drop dead. It was absolute panic, shouting and confusion,” he said. Not any more.
“We can still take whatever they throw at us,” said Palat. Almost immediately after the carnage ended, she said people wanted to come back to the Taj, a place for royalty and whose guests included everyone from John Lennon and Yoko Ono and Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis to US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who came this year and said Indians and the world wouldn’t stop living because of the threat of terrorism.  “We were inundated by messages from people who had never been here and regular customers,” said Palat. “It’s a humbling experience to know the whole world was affected by what happened to you,” she said. The General Manager, who carries a grief that can’t be measured, is back at his post along with the surviving staff of the Taj Mahal Palace and Towers, and the Towers, which was built in the 1970s next to the Palace, opened its doors 23 days after the terrorists walked in the front door and started firing. The Palace will reopen later this year because not even terrorism can close this hotel.
 Andy@NEurope.eu