तेर्रोरिस्ट्स इन Mumbai

It's been a stressful night. There have been a whole series of bomb blasts. And this time they targetted two 5 star hotels, the Taj Mahal hotel just opp. the Gateway of India and the Trident, formerly the Oberois. Since our office is close to the Taj we could actually hear some of the blasts. Over 100 people have died. Some of the dead include staff of the two hotels and police personnel, including the Anti-Terrorist Squad chief, Hemant Karkera. Another famous 'encounter' specialist, Vijay Salaskar also died. It's 9am now in India and there are still hostages in the hotels.

The terrorists are supposed to have come in by boats (rubberised dinghy boats). There have been blasts in other parts of the city too but this time there have been more in South Mumbai. There has never been anything like this, on such a large scale, in Mumbai. These terrorists are foreigners I think, and not Indians. Some of the terrorists also holed up in a building, Nariman House, in Colaba.

My brother-in-law Vinod Shekhar, who is a Municipal Corporator and mother-in-law, MLA, Annie Shekhar went on rounds last night after some of the blasts. We didn't want him to go especially since it's been just two months since he had a major heart surgery but he said that since it's his constituency it was his responsibility to do so. He also went to the hospitals later. I don't think he slept for even 2 hours cos early in the morning, before 5 am he was called to the Chief Minister's house for a meeting. They are either there or at Mantralaya.

There are Rapid Action Force personnel, commandos and the military has been callled in but so far there's been no solution to the problem.