Some like Zubair came to study. Others were like Hemlata Yadav (18), who had recently joined the Home Guards and was looking to apply for a government job to help send her young brother to an English medium school; like Pratik Patil, who also at 18 was trying his best to be the elder son of the family but got caught on the wrong train while going to check if his younger sister had got admission in her new college; like Ashok Vaghela (40), the CA for whom things were beginning to fall in place as the family was finally able to move out of their chawl to a flat in Borivali; like Yogesh Futane (26), who was working hard to get an MBA amidst his personal tragedy of losing his two-month-old son to malaria; like Chandrakanth Mithani (65), who was simply soaking in the moment he was waiting for all his life: becoming a grandfather; like Aejaz Sheikh (41), whose high-point of the day would be at midnight when he would return from work and chat with his 10-year-old daughter, Anam, both discussing animatedly how her school day had passed; like “dosto ka aziz” Salim Kundiwala (42), that free spirit, who was putting together some money to take his ageing mother on a Haj pilgrimage...

All their stories had to be told. For these were people whose heart beat for Mumbai. And that heartbeat could not be silenced on our pages by generalising them as “victims”. That is why we chose the difficult path of writing about each one them. Talking about grief isn’t easy. Yet, they couldn’t be dismissed as mere statistics. That’s how the series, 187 Mumbai Life Stories, was conceived. One story for one person. Each story chronicling a seemingly ordinary person who led an extraordinary life. In a city of real inconveniences and unforeseen challenges.

... contd.