For Mumbai resident Upalakhsha Tiwari (23), it took a few minutes to understand what it was all about.
“I was sitting on the steps at the entrance of German Bakery. When my friends and I finished eating, we heard something behind,” Tiwari said.
“After some time, someone picked me up and brought me to the hospital.”
Tiwari suffered injuries on his face.
Pravin Kumar, an employee at German Bakery, told the police that when the blast was detonated, the place was almost full, with about 70 customers.
“After the explosion, I discovered that a chair was on my head with most of the bakery’s furniture having been ripped apart,” Kumar, who had come from Kathmandu recently, said.
AlBadhani Sagr Sadh (28), a Yemeni national, said: “I went to the bakery to buy some stuff. I was coming out when I heard a loud explosion. Within seconds, I realised that the heat had ruined my vision and I could not see anything.” He is now at Surya hospital in Pune.
In Kolkata, Aishik Dhar (17), a resident of Salt Lake, is now staying with his relatives because his parents have gone to Pune to bring back the bodies of his brother and sister.
{{/usCountry}}In Kolkata, Aishik Dhar (17), a resident of Salt Lake, is now staying with his relatives because his parents have gone to Pune to bring back the bodies of his brother and sister.
{{/usCountry}}His brother, Ankik (23), who graduated from IIT-Kharagpur in 2008, and his sister, Anindi (19), an economics student at Fergusson College, Pune, died in Saturday’s blast at German Bakery. Seven others too died in the blast. All were in their twenties and thirties.
Aishik’s father, Kamalendu Dhar, is a senior official with the Oil and Natural Gas Commission. Ankik had joined investment bank JP Morgan in Mumbai about a year ago.
Their friend Shilpa Goenka, youngest of the three daughters of Rajesh Goenka, a Kolkata-based trader and also a resident of Salt Lake, was among those who died in the blast. She used to work with the IT wing of Japanese stock broking firm Namura in Mumbai.
Shilpa’s maternal uncle Mahendra Saraogi said the explosive-laden bag exploded under the table where the three (Shilpa, Ankik and Anindi) were sitting. “When a bakery staff member opened the bag, the bomb exploded,” he said.