On Wednesday night as the world watched in horror all that unfolded in the island city, Pratika Pradip Patil, a trainee chef at the Taj hotel, survived to tell the tale of the gory attack. However, she lost her colleagues who died when terrorists stormed the hotel kitchen and opened fire on the staff. “I felt I would never be able to come out of the hotel but somehow I managed but my friends could not,” grieved the 20-year-old chef who is also a student at the Sophia Polytechnic.

Pratika along with her colleagues- the famous executive chef, Banja, kitchen in-charge, Kaizad, chefs Matin, Raghu, Nitin and kitchen staff Sadanand Patil and Gautam Singh- was at work when at 9:30 pm she heard the first round of firing followed by sound of a blast. “The terrorists entered the hotel by the main gate immediately after the Leopold firing, as all attention of the security guards was diverted towards the hotel’s back entrance,” said Patil.

According to Patil as soon as the terrorists entered Taj, they went to the hotel’s lobby and entered restaurant Shamiana. “From Shamiana they moved up to the first floor where 11 of our banquet halls and one restaurant is located including the ballroom and Crystal,” Patil said, adding that a gathering of over 400 high-profile guests was underway as the terrorists attacked these places. “They opened indiscriminate fire at Crystal room and headed towards the third, fourth and fifth floors from where they started hurling grenades,” said Patil. After that, she recalls, there was a brief pause in firing and the terrorists hid themselves in room 631of the hotel. In no time they entered the kitchen and started firing at the staff killing chef Banja and kitchen-in-charge, chef Zaheen Matin. chefs Raghu and Nitin were also fired at, but are now safe. “The mayhem lasted till 5:30 in the morning on Thursday. I was hiding along with three other colleagues in the basement of the hotel. That is when the hotel’s security staff asked us to shift to the first floor where other guests were hiding. As soon as we started moving towards the first floor we heard another round of firing following which we ran out from the basement and bumped into the commandos,” said Patil.

... contd.