But how many people know that this is where local Muslims rescued Hindu families in neighbouring buildings; where Shiv Sena activists saved Christian families and gave protection to a nearby mosque and a madarassa; where a Parsi baker—his bakery, located bang opposite Nariman House, still carries scores of bullet marks from the terrorists’ AK-47s—distributed bread to hungry neighbours; and where a Christian do-gooder carried the bullet-ridden body of a Hindu girl on his shoulders, reached her to the hospital and a month later, on Christmas, played Santa to her in the hospital ward?

The function near Nariman House was organised by Vijay Surve, head of the Shiv Sena’s Colaba branch. He and his ‘boys’ evacuated hundreds of residents of the nearby buildings before NSG commandos arrived—10 hours after the attack. Since the commandos from Delhi had no knowledge of the narrow lanes of this highly congested part of Colaba, Shiv Sainiks assisted them in every possible way. The Sena has the image of being an anti-Muslim organisation. But this stereotype was broken by what I saw at the function and, later, by conducting three days of extensive interviews in the neighbourhood. Surve proudly showed me the letter he received from the NSG, in which the commander who led the operation has expressed “deepest gratitude” to the locals for their help.

On 26/12, Surve honoured all those who performed commendable acts of bravery during the 60-hour-long siege of Nariman House, the most difficult of all the operations mounted by security forces in Mumbai. One person, Felix Ambrose, received a particularly long ovation. Felix lives near Nariman House and works at a small phone-and-internet shop next to Leopold Restaurant, where terrorists killed over a dozen people, before storming the Taj. He was lucky to survive. But that night he made eight trips to the hospital carrying wounded persons lying on the road. The first was Anamika Gupta, who, when I met her in the hospital, said to me, “I am alive only because of my brother Felix.”

... contd.