Let us Stand up and Salute ASI Tukaram Omble

Other than the three top cops of Mumbai police, Hemant Karkare, Ashok Kamte and Vijay Salaskar who were killed in the recent attack on Mumbai by terrorists, people have forgotten a real hero. Tukaram Omble, 48, Assistant Sub-Inspector (ASI), the only cop who with his daredevil courage was helped in the nabbing of a terrorist on 26/11 alive.

Omble was asked by his senior officer to take up a position on Marine drive on Wednesday night, as soon as the news of firings at Leopold Café, Oberoi and Taj Hotels came in.

Subsequently, at 12.45 am, Omble got an alert on his walkie-talkie that two terrorists had hijacked a Skoda car and were heading towards Girgaum Chowpatty. Minutes later Omble saw the Skoda drtiving past him. He jumped onto his two- wheeler and chased the terrorist’s car.

A team from the DB Marg police station was busy setting up a naka bandi at the Chowpatty signal. As soon as the car approached the signal the terrorists fired at the police team but had to reduce the speed of the car, thanks to the barricades laid by the police team for naka bandi.

Omble overtook the Skoda and stopped in front of it, forcing the driver of the car to change the direction towards right and hit the divider.

With one terrorist busy controlling the car, Omble sprang on other terrorist, Amir Kasab and caught hold of the barrel of the AK-47 rifle with both hands. In retaliation Kasab pulled the trigger of the gun, whose barrel was pointed towards Omble.

A spray of bullets entered Omble’s stomach and intestines. But the latter held on to the gun until his last breath, stopping Kasab from shooting anyone else.

In next to no time other cops arrived and killed another terrorist, Ismail, pounced on Kasab and captured him.Investigating agencies were successful in gathering lot of information from the sole terrorist who has been arrested. But this was only possible because of Omble’s daredevil move.

Omble is survived by his wife and four daughters. He is a real hero, who has been forgotten by people as well as the politicians who are busy in resigning and giving up their responsibilities rather than to fight against such terrorism.

Original Article here

Bombay Terror Attacks

It has been many days since the actual siege of Bombay ended.

But it will take many days before the mental siege ends.

The terror attacks on Bombay have been widely reported all over the world with a lot of on the ground coverage and live telecasts being beamed into our homes as the events unfolded.

Major takeaways from the tragedy are;

1. Politicians are only interested in holding on to their seats and their inaction vis-a-vis modernizing the police force led to poor response to the situation. The bureaucrats that advise our politicians are equally to blame as they impede the decision making process in every department of the government. All concerned (actors in this sordid drama) should not only be axed but should face a court case of culpable homicide amounting to murder. They, if convicted, should be handed out capital punishment setting a precedent for all to follow.

2. Atrium type design in hotels, malls, hospitals and other buildings offered the terrorists strategic advantage when it came to fighting our brave soldiers.

3. While our commandos fought these bastards, no special tools, such as building plans, walk throughs were made available to them. They fought a brave a often blind battle against the well entrenched terrorists.

4. Building designs should be done in such a way that it is possible to isolate sections of the building without affecting the ability to rescue hostages. All buildings should have mandatory fire escapes on their exteriors.

5. While the Television Journalists did a commendable job of live reportage, they should have factored in the possibility of their reportage being used by the controllers in guiding the terrorists. Henceforth, TV media should not be allowed to cover such events live, at best they can be given a controlled feed from ground zero by a single responsible source and the feed should be suitably time delayed.

6. Elevators (Lifts as we call them in India) should have remote management capabilities thus allowing the manager to restrict their use in emergencies. In high rises such a facility will restrict movement of terrorists from one floor to another.

7. Buildings, especially public buildings should have a sanitized approach area. All people entering the premises should walk down at least a 50 meter corridor before entering any building. Cars should not be allowed to be parked or driven to the building. Everyone, and that means everyone (including the President and Prime Minister) should follow this rule.

8. All police men on the street all over the country should be armed with AK-47 or AK-56 assult rifles and should be provided with enough ammunition to last them for a 30 minute engagement with any terrorist. All .303 rifles should be immediately discarded. Police personell manning important positions should be provided with latest communication hardware and protective gear to protect them in case of any attack.

9. Security of elected representatives should be scaled back till the security on the street does not equal of exceed the requirements of these elected representatives.

10. Every state should have an ERT (Emergency Response Team) with the same level of training as the NSG to take the menace hands on.

11. Real time surveillance of buildings should be done using high resolution video equipment and not useless CCTV systems that hardly produce any useful input to the control center.

12. Video feed should be available over Internet such that the need of a control center is done away with.

I am sure I will be able to add a lot of other suggestions to this list as time goes by.

I am also sure that the authorities that be are more smarter than me and can think and implement much more that this small list that I have put up.