Mumbai's First's

The first anniversary has come and gone. The speeches have stopped and the various ceremonies over. Ceremonies of different religions whereprayers are held to commemorate a life rudely interrupted a year ago. Or the temporary grave marker is replaced with a permanent gravestone. Because the mud in a freshly filled grave takes a year to settle down.
At The Taj and at the Oberoi were our leaders. Our captains of industry. People who regularly decided the fate of all the many minions who worked for them. People who led from the front.
Hadn’t even one of them seen Air Force One? Where Harrison Ford being the President of America takes his plane back from the terrorists. Takes it back himself. Doesn’t send waiters and bell hops to take the flak. Doesn’t cower behind curtains. Doesn’t wait like a lamb to be slaughtered or led to safety by rescuing firefighters or commandos. Tales of bravery there were a plenty after that day last November. But the bravery of simpler people. People who served the guests. Guests who were looked up to as strong and decisive in the course of a normal day. Who were considered smart because of the wealth they’d accrued. Six terrorists against a few hundred. Yeah I know those six had guns. And grenades. And training. While the few hundred didn’t even know what was happening. Sure. Not even after two days. Not even after cell phoe updates and news bulletins that played out on the large flat screen TV’s . So we had heroes who caught a train every day to work from the distant suburbs of Mumbai. Who changed into uniforms when they reached their place of work. Who had ration cards and EMI’s. Who never held sway over anyone else’s paycheck. Who were at the head of lines seeking escape routes.
Of course. If you are the guy who collects the laundry left outside hotel rooms that’s a much higher qualification to be the rescuer than someone who spends 5 hours every week on the golf course and twenty in a board room.
“Cccan you get my file back. It’s important . I think I left it in the coffee shop. “
For the sake of that file a life was lost. While a stupid politico was giving away, where he was hidden away with the sound bites to the TV channel over his cell phone. The list goes on. Of the bravery of the little people. Who died trying to save the ass of someone who did’nt have the balls to do anything other than save his own.
RIP
Hemant Karkare
Ashokrao Kamathe
Tukaram Ombale
Vijay Sahdev Salaskar
Arun Chitte
Ms. Mehanabi Salim Hahharwala
Salim Ali Harharwala
Subhash Vanmali Vaghela
Peerpasha Mehboob Alisheikh
Shashank Chandrasen Shinde
Prakash More
Vijay Khandekar
M L Chaudhari
Babban Babu Hugade
Aijazbhai Haji Imansahab Dalal
Rahimatullah
Jayawant Hanumata Patil
Yogesh Shivaji Patil
Babusaheb Dhurgude
Ambadas Pawar
Babasaheb Chandrakant Bhosale
Sitaram Mahalba Sakhare
Mukesh Bikaji Jadhav
Kamal Nanakram Motwani
Bret Gilbert Taylor (Australia)
Ms Meera M Chaterjee
Michael Stuart Moss (Australia)
Ashfar Ali Shaikh
Sareena Sasuddin Sheikh
Nitesh Vijaykumar Sharma
Gaurav Walchand Jain
Malyesh Manvendra Banerjee
Jugaran Hedriz Rudolph (German)
Thomas Verghese
Sadanand Patil
Steve Darfane (German)
Ms Neeta Prakash Gaikwad
Abbas Razzaq Ansari
Ms Rakhila Abbas Ansari
Sarjerao Sadashiv Bhosale
Wilson Baburao Mandlik
Mohammed Ilyas Ansari
Kainath Nagar Kamruddin
Andes Don Tevera (British)
T Suda D Lashi (Chinese)
Farooq Dinshaw Ehaliya
Maibeb Vimanchandra
Antinio D Lorenza (Italy)
Sandeep Unni krishnan
Ms Ami Vipinchandra Thakar
Jordan Gracy Fernandes
Ms Gehara Kanamani alias Jina (Thailand)
Sunil Shevti Parekh
Ms Reshma Sunil Parekh
Ajit Srichandra Chabaria
Ms Monica Ajit Chabaria
Sanjay Vijay Agarwal
Rita Sanjay Agarwal
Rahul Subhash Shinde
Ms Harsha Mohit Azrani
Mohit Kanahya Hazrani
Allan Michael Share (America)
Ms Helen Konoli (Canada)
Ms Uma Govind Garg
Eklaq Mohammed Mushtaq Ahmed
Pankaj Sompad Shah
Ravidas
Lokayu Michael Pudedan (Singapore)
Gajendra Singh
Ashok Kapur
Anant Suryadutt Bhatt
Rohin Baji
Kannobhai Javeribhai Patel
Maqsood Mubarak Ali Sheikh
Rivika Gabrial Holtsberg (Israel)
Rabbi Gabriel Holtsberg (Israel)
Feriz Gimal Ahmak Khan
Rabbi Ben Zion Chromin (Israel)
Ms Sabina Saikia
Udaysingh Karamveer Singh Kang
Nitishsingh Karamveer Singh Kang
Samveer Singh Karamveer Singh Kang
Ms. Yokovit Mosho Uspaz (Israel)
Hemakshi Pillai
Rabbi Arye Teitelbaum (Israel)
Sushil Kumar Sharma
Arkha Solanki
Sunil Thakre
Kajhi Thakre
Vinod Gupta
Abu Ismail
Mohammed Amanat Ali
Chandulal Tandel
Prakash Sandal
Boris do Rego
Gunjan Narang
Vijay Thana
Neelam Narang
Burki Ralph (Germany)
Muti Arjun Ansari
Rupinder Devendra Wadhawa
Ravi Kunvar
Saptakam Rehmatullah Shaukat Ali
Murti Pavastin
Hasibul Rehman Fajuddin Rehman Shaikh
Aditya Ashok Yadav
Deepali Janardhan Chitekar
Raju Janardhan Chitekar
Mohammed Kukhtar Mallik
Noorul Islam Azahar Mulla
Ms Shashabai Baburao Khratmal
Aminabegum Hamid Sheikh
Shirish Savla Chari
Afreen S Qureshi
Sanjay Surve
P K Gopalkrishna
Thakur Budha Vaghela
Ms Jasmine
Vijay Katkar
Bhagan Gangaram Shinde
Aziz Nabullal Rampuri
Shoeb Ahmed Shaikh
Misarilal Morya
Shahabuddin S Khan
Harishbhai D Goyal
Zahir Sayyed Nasir Ali

A Mumbai Christmas Story.

They set up the crib. In the living room cum bedroom cum dining room cum study that formed one of the two rooms they called home. The neighbours all came to see it. Every evening they’d gather around the crib for the rosary.
"Why is Jesus crying ?" asked the littlest .
"What?"
"See he has a tear drop ."
They wiped it away from the little statue in the crib and it was gone. But it was back again the next day. And the next.
Soon a frenzy. Even the Parish priest coming in to see for himself the miracle of the weeping baby Jesus. A line in the passage outside. It was playing hell with their daily schedule.
Sodom and Gommorah . That’s why he was crying. For the sins of the world. For the waywardness of the world. For the acts of war and genocide. For the starving millions in Africa. For the lack of vocations to the seminary. For the blatantness of the page 3 pin up. For the way the terrosists attacked the city.
Soon the tears were a flood.
Damn! The bathroom on the floor above was leaking.

Eid Mubarak !

“Abraham!” God called.
“Yes,” he replied. “Here I am.”
“Take your son, your only son—yes, Isaac, whom you love so much—. Go and sacrifice him as a burnt offering. "
The next morning Abraham got up early and took two of his servants with him, along with his son, Isaac. Abraham told the servants. “The boy and I will travel a little farther. We will worship there, and then we will come right back.”
Isaac turned to Abraham and said, “Father?”
“Yes, my son?” Abraham replied.
the boy said, “ where is the sheep for the burnt offering?”
“God will provide a sheep for the burnt offering, my son,” Abraham answered, and they both walked on together. Past the crowds that are always there in a city. Finding themselves suddenly moving in a direction nobody else was going. While the station announcer kept instructing people to go back. Alone on the platform with only a young man ahead of them. A young man in a blue shirt and black pant. A bag on his back and a gun in his hand.
When Abraham recovered he opened his eyes. To a fallen Issac next to him. Silent.
The angel of the Lord called to him from heaven, “Abraham! Abraham!”
“Yes,” Abraham replied. “Here I am!” The angel said. “Now I know that you truly fear God. You have not withheld from me even your son, your only son.”

Bang Bang Boom.

It pays to know Leela .She’s a journalist. So she gets to meet up with the rich and famous. Or did circa March 1993.Her brief for the day was to meet Ian Anderson. Sometimes mistakenly called Jethro Tull. That was the name of the band, not the man.
He was on a pre concert tour of India. Staying at the Oberoi. Right next to the Air India building. Which only a few days earlier had been bombed. RDX ripping thru the lobby. Destroying things and people. The first question that Leela asked in her allotted fifteen minutes with the legend was whether he had any apprehensions about coming to Bombay so soon after the blasts. Going to India with warnings from the British Government that said do at your own risk ? Yes he did. But he was from England. He’s gone thru the antics of the IRA. Seen the damage terrorists could do first hand. If he didn’t come to Mubai the terrorists had won. Won what they set out to do. Which was to disrupt life. To dictate what you did and when. Dictated by fear. Terrorists , terrorise. But if we stay home, they win. So here he was in the lobby of the Oberoi. Posing for a picture with his flute. Balancing on one leg against the back drop of Marine Drive and the Arabian Sea. A million miles from home. On a trip nobody would have questioned him not making.
The interview went on , to musical influences, and defining moments in life. What he ate for dinner and what the next album was going to be about. And how his daughter was not a fan of his music. She wanted to know why he didn’t play some Bon Jovi covers.
That day with him, the terrorists did not win.