Bombay Times Continues to Ask

The saga of the questions continues…. Some rehashed questions from yesterday, some new ones, still the level of journalism remains abysmally low... I guess as some of my friends have said, in these times of recession when advertisers are holding back on spending, the media has to fill spaces. Too bored to really answer these again… Though atleast some of the questions are valid this time around.

1 Why are we bothering to convince Pakistan that the terrorists came from across the border? Why not have a world press conference in Mumbai where the surviving and arrested terrorist is produced before international media and made to confess his origin, where he was trained, and who gave him his orders?

2 Why didn’t the Colaba police chase and engage the terrorists behind the Leopold massacre as they walked down a bylane to Taj, firing at passersby? The shooting in the eatery reportedly lasted between two to four minutes. Wasn’t that time enough, and wasn’t it loud enough, for the Colaba police across the road to get their act together?

3 Why did the security forces at CST who reportedly fought back the terrorists who killed 60 passengers there not follow them onto D N Road and then Cama Hospital, where they lay in ambush for Karkare, Kamte and Salaskar? Why were these two terrorists just allowed to walk away?

4 Interrogation of terrorist Azam Amir Kasav, who was captured on Wednesday night while another was killed at Chowpatty, revealed that there were only eight terrorists between Taj, Oberoi and Nariman House. With this knowledge, couldn’t operations at the two hotels which have several access points been hastened? After all, there were just three terrorists each in Taj and Oberoi, and how much of these large properties could they be expected to cover? Whereas 200 commandos could have simultaneously stormed both hotels — 25 at a time from each entry. Surely, this would have been effective.

5 When terrorists hijack a plane, commandos surround the aircraft and charge only when negotiations fail; or when they know that passengers are being killed. In Mumbai’s case, there was never any doubt right from 9.30 pm on Wednesday that the terrorists were ruthlessly killing people. There weren’t any hostages; only hotel guests in hiding. Whoever the terrorists saw, they gunned down. This information the authorities got through SMSes and calls from inside the hotels. Yet, the commandos took so much time to storm the hotels.

6 Such a huge cache of arms, ammunition and explosives as was used at Taj and Oberoi would have been difficult to conceal in hotel rooms. How did the room service miss it?

7 The Mumbai Fishermen’s Association claims it warned the Chief Minister and police about RDX being smuggled into Mumbai through Gujarat. If true, why was no action taken on this information?

8 Strangely, the entire focus was on the ongoing terrorist action at Taj, Oberoi and Nariman House. Why was what happened at CST and Leopold kept out of the news?

9 Who was calling the shots in Mumbai? The Chief Minister, the Home Minister, the Director General of Police, the Police Commissioner, the top brass of the Army?

10 If Union Home Minister Shivraj Patil resigned owning moral responsibility for the terror attacks on Mumbai, what’s holding back Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister and Home Minister R R Patil? Even Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh?

Bombay Times Questions on Mumbai Terror Attacks

Today's Bombay Times had this article which complied a list of questions that the Mumbaikar's were asking (I presume they are asking the government for answers). As I read through it, I felt this sense of disbelief and disgust, how stupid can some of they be? How immersed in their small worlds are they that they are asking such stupid questions...

1 How come the Colaba Police did not respond to the Leopold massacre? The restaurant is just across the road and the sound of the AK-47 gunfire, the screams of the victims, the chaos of motorists escaping the scene... ought to have been audible at least 100 metres away.

Given the fast moving nature of the raid do you think the terrorists waited at Leo's for the cops to show up. The police probably had to move fast to the places where the current attacks were in progress. Namely Nariman Point & the Taj. And if you think cops don't respond to gunfire, try bursting crackers outside your local police station.


2 Why weren’t the casualties sent to elite, private hospitals like Breach Candy and Jaslok nearby, and even Hinduja and Leelavati further away, when the facilities and infrastructure at government-run St. George, GT and JJ Hospitals were clearly incapable of dealing with the vast number of injured, dying and dead?

Well have You looked at the Map? These Hospitals are the closest? Or are you saying that given that these people were of the higher social strata they are used to the comforts of Breach Candy etc they should have been taken there!!!

And when was the last time the author visited the JJ or the St. George Hospital? Have you seen the size of the campus or taken into account the number of medical students on it's campuses who can be deployed to render aid.

3 If the terrorists had detailed blueprints of the Taj and Oberoi, why weren’t the NSG commandos provided with them before conducting rescue operations?

The NSG were not conducting operations in the dark, they had the details but the terrorists didn't have trackers on them which would help the commandos pin point exact location so they obviously had to comb each floor and each room.. Infact the terrorists kept moving, which made things difficult. But they still persevered to ensure that they were successful.

4 What purpose did the visits by politicians like Sonia Gandhi, Manmohan Singh, L K Advani and Jaswant Singh serve? How dare Narendra Modi offer Hemant Karkare’s family a cash compensation? Hadn’t he criticised the ATS chief and called him anti-national just a short while ago?

If they didn't visit then you would be the first person to ask why they were not present in this time of crisis.

5 It took the combined efforts over 60 hours of the Mumbai Police and hundreds of commandos of the Army, Navy and National Security Guard to flush out just 20-odd terrorists armed with sophisticated weapons and explosives... how will we ever fare in a war with hostile, nuclear-armed neighbours?

This was not a WAR!!!! There were civilians present, if that had not been the case, then all that the Navy wld have to do was fire a from one of the nearby warships and obliterate the complete hotel along with the terrorists... How about that!

6 How did the few terrorists manage to carry on their campaign over three days without sleep and food? Whereas each place under siege had to regularly have fresh and new teams of commandos pressed into operation over the 60 hours.

Well you can ask them, if it was u'r life on the line, I;m sure you would find it in you to not sleep for 60 hrs... And who said they didn't have food??

7 How did the terrorists sneak all that sophisticated weaponry and explosives past hotel security which otherwise looks into every woman’s handbag and frisks men entering the premises?

The didn't wait to get frisked, they stormed the Hotels..

8 Why weren’t the Taj and Oberoi simultaneously stormed by the hundreds of commandos from all entries, with additional forces dropped onto the roof by choppers as at Nariman House, when it was known that there were just few terrorists holed up inside the hotels? Wouldn’t such an operation have taken the terrorists by surprise? After all, they weren’t guarding all the entries...

Are you an ex NSG personnel? Have you received any training on handling hostage situations? Or maybe even counter insurgency operations? Cause your question presumes a high level of tactical knowledge of these things. Well one word of advice, don't take all the movies too seriously.. This is not Die Hard 5.0

9 Were attempts made to contact the terrorists and negotiate the release of hostages? Aren’t hostages taken for a purpose such as barter against a safe escape, the release of imprisoned terrorists, huge amounts of cash, etc?

It was pretty clear that the terrorists were not interested in negotiations... They were there with a mission to kill as many people as possible and the only reason they didn't kill them all at one go was so that they could stretch the mission and cause more destruction..

10 Who was in charge of the entire rescue operation? Wouldn’t one competent and deciding authority have handled it faster and smoother and more responsibly? Shouldn’t it have been the state home ministry?

Let's look at who all were involved.
Round 1 :The Mumbai Police, Maharashtra ATS (State Home Ministry)
Round 2 :The Army, Navy, RAF (The Central Govt)
Round 3 : NSG ((The Central Govt)

As you can see with the increasing gravity of the situation more and more resources were brought in with increasing levels of expertise . The final phase of the operation was controlled by the MARCOS and the NSG who are specifically trained to handle these situations. And now tell me which one of these agencies would you have left out? And which one of these would you have given control to?

11 What happens to the lone, captured terrorist? Who gets custody of him? Who interrogates him? Did the Indian government really expect Pakistan to send its ISI chief over to help in the probe?

Well I think they are planning n sending him home, after he recovers obviously!!! Or maybe they are going to hand over custody to you. So Pls send in your address.

12 Where were the carbine-wielding policemen on CST when the terrorists opened fire? Aren’t the GRP and RPF offices on the station? Why didn’t they prevent the terrorists from walking away calmly after the massacre towards Cama Hospital to kill again?

I concede this is valid question, and hopefully the answers shld emerge in the due course of time.

13 Who is going to tell the politicians where they get off? Who will cast the first stone of a civil revolution, a people’s war, against the corrupt and communal leaders who have brought the nation to this brink of complete destruction?

Just one question I wanna ask you, do you vote? And if you did, then for whom? The "corrupt and communal leaders" did not seize power, they were elected... Currently the politicians have become the equivalent of the "foreign hand" for all of us citizens... We get the government we vote .

Having tried to answer these questions allegedly raised by concerned Mumbaikar's I now have a few questions of my own. Questions regarding the discretion of the editor of Bombay Times for having published such a list of ill thought thru questions.

Yes questions will be asked, as they shld be. But it rests on the so called responsible media to give them due credence or not. Case in point were the terrorists actually of the majority community, as theorised by The Chinese "People's Daily".

The Bombay Times has never been know to be at the cutting edge of Journalism, they shld stick to reporting about half naked starlets and wannabe celebs prancing at Page 3 events. Btw who is Gurpreet Gill? Is medianet already back in action?

Guys this time, you really hit a new low.

Sunset

Was sipping coffee and watching the sun go down today.. the best part of being your own boss is to be to go off and do these small things..

getting back to the sunset, the sun was sinking softly like it was pulling on a old comfortable cashmere pullover, which has been faded with repeated washing... there was no drama in this one unlike the those witnessed a month back..

It seemed like the sun after having used up all it's energies beating down on the city and making everyone sweat through out the day was finally tired and just wanted to cuddle up and sleep.. contrast this to the monsoons when it hardly gets to shine through so at sunset it uses all it's pent up energies to create the most spectacularly dazzling show in the evening, using all the various colours it has at it's disposal.. starting with the golden light, moving to the brilliant orange and then to the the beautiful purple..

each with it's own story..