Sixty hours of terror: The attack on Mumbai

Jason Motlagh, Special to the Pulitzer Center
Virginia Quarterly Review

Over the past two years the Pulitzer Center has supported Jason Motlagh's reporting from south Asia, working in collaboration with print and broadcast outlets to produce extraordinary projects on India, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Afghanistan. Over the next four days, in an exclusive online report for Virginia Quarterly Review, Jason recounts in searing, unforgettable detail, in words and photographs, the terrorist attacks a year ago this week on the heart of Mumbai. We are honored to share this work with the readers of Untold Stories.

SIXTY HOURS OF TERROR, PART 3

Police encircle Nariman House (Apoorva Guptay)

IV. "NO HOSTAGES SHOULD REMAIN ALIVE"

1 A.M. Kasab Interrogation: Part I

Ajmal Kasab spoke before a question was asked: "I have committed a big mistake."

He lay flat on the hospital mattress, a brown blanket covering his naked body from feet to chest. His hair was wet with sweat. Gauze bandages cloaked his arms from wrists to biceps, but the girth of his forearms suggested a solid build. Another patch covered the right side of his neck. Exposed was a gash on his clean-shaven chin. His eyes were squeezed shut as the police interrogator, standing at the edge of the bed, introduced himself to the prisoner and the video camera that was rolling.

"On whose insistence?"

"At the behest of Chacha." The mysterious Uncle Zaki.

For more of Jason Motlagh's report, see his article in Virginia Quarterly Review.

For related reporting, see Simon Marks' "India's Global Ambitions," a series of reports for The NewsHour.