Words of 26/11 terrorists still ringing in my ears: Witness

A staff of hotel Taj, who was taken hostage by the terrorists during the 26/11 attacks, on Friday told the court that he heard one of the attackers telling his companions to throw grenade and set the hotel on fire.

A staff of hotel Taj, who was taken hostage by the terrorists during the 26/11 attacks, on Friday told the court that he heard one of the attackers telling his companions to throw grenade and set the hotel on fire.

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"'Throw grenades and set the hotel on fire....,' these words uttered by a terrorist on the night of November 26 last during terror attacks at hotel Taj are still ringing in my ears," Adil Irani, a steward with the hotel, told the court.

Thirtyone-year-old Adil, who was taken hostage for about four hours by four suspected Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) operatives, said the attackers were very abusive and had assaulted some hostages very badly.

Adil said the terrorist was telling his companions that they must throw hand grenades and torch the hotel at once. "This frightened me but I kept quiet", he told Special Public Prosecutor Ujjwal Nikam.

On Thursday, a banker had described in the court how he was taken hostage and the way he escaped. The witness told Judge M L Tahaliyani that a terrorist was talking to somebody on mobile phone and told the person on the other side "Panch murge pakde hain, ek bada murga hai (we have captured five people, one of them is a big man)".

"My mobile which terrorists had kept with them, rang and my wife inquired about me. The terrorist who picked up the cell phone got furious and told her that 'Operation hatao nahin to Tabahi macha denge' (stop the Operation or else we would create havoc)," he said.