Ajmal Kasab

In the face of overwhelming support for the death sentence of Mohammed Ajmal Kasab, the lone surviving gunman from the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks, a survivor who narrowly escaped a mass execution during the three-day siege believes the terrorist should not be hung.

“No one is guilty all alone,”says Seyfi Muezzinoglu, a Turkish architect. “Those who hold the gun are sure to be punished, but their lords represent the real evil.”
Kasab, 21, was sentenced May 6 to five separate death sentences and five life sentences for his role in the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks, in which 166 people were killed at several venues, during a three-day siege of the city by 10 young gunmen. He is expected to be hanged, following an appeals process (that’s a separate story).

"The depravity of the attacks is unspeakable - this man has lost the right to humanitarian benefits," said Judge M.L. Tahaliyani, adding that there was no possible hope for Kasab’s rehabilitation.

Across India, people celebrated Kasab’s death sentence and called for a swift hanging. At Chattrapathi Shivaji Terminus railway station, one of the 2008 attack sites, activists set off firecrackers to commemorate the verdict.

But Muezzinoglu, who with his wife was spared from death by the gunmen, said Kasab should not be killed. “We should go after (the masterminds) and not after the poor indoctrinated soldiers fulfilling their orders,” he said.

“For them, a lifelong prison sentence without any hope for an early release is much more frightening than a brief execution.”

The Istanbul resident and his wife Meltem were on their first trip to India Nov. 26, 2008, to attend a conference in Mumbai. Later that evening, as they were enjoying their first dinner in India, the couple was taken hostage at a restaurant at the Oberoi Hotel.

According to Muezzinoglu, two young gunmen, Fadullah and Abdul, took a group of 25 people hostage that evening and held them captive for nine hours. At about 3 a.m. that night, using Meltem Muezzinoglu’s cell phone, the militants marched the group up to the terrace of the Oberoi Hotel, and began a mass execution.

As the Muezzinoglus watched everyone around them dying, they began to say the Islamic prayers for the dead, which may have saved them.

“It is not a good feeling to know you are spared because of your religion,” said Seyfi Muezzinoglu. “It is a terrible feeling to know the others were killed for their religion.”

“We were also expecting to be killed, but they suddenly rose and left,” he said, adding, “They even said a farewell of a kind.”

“We were spared by those killers who were now going to a certain death. We knew it and they knew it,” said Muezzinoglu.

In the U.S., Kia Scherr was visiting family in Florida for Thanksgiving dinner, when she received news about her husband Alan, and 13-year-old daughter Naomi, who had traveled to Mumbai to attend a spiritual retreat of the Synchronicity Foundation at the Oberoi Hotel.

The State Department called Scherr to say the Oberoi Hotel was under terrorist siege. Two days later, she received the dreaded call: Alan and Naomi had been killed by terrorists, Alan with a shot to the head.

But Scherr also believes Kasab should not be killed. “‘I’ve made a terrible mistake,’” Scherr quoted Kasab as saying during the sentencing, noting that he cried as Tahaliyani made the pronouncement.

“I thought there might be a glimmer of hope when he bowed his head and wept,” Scherr told India-West from her home in the Blue Ridge mountains of Virginia, adding that she believed the young man could be rehabilitated by meeting the families of his victims, including herself.

“If we related to him as a human being, he could open up and become a powerful voice against terrorism,” said Scherr, adding that Kasab could also potentially share more information about the masterminds behind the attacks.

Since the attacks, Scherr has founded the One Life Alliance to promote global peace. She plans to launch a chapter in Mumbai this November, on the second anniversary of the attacks.

“We must respond with love and compassion. There are more of us than there are terrorists,” said Scherr.

But Amit Chandrashekhar Peshave, manager of the Taj Hotel’s Shamiana restaurant at the time of the attacks, believes Kasab should be hung immediately, without the possibility of appeal.

“These people had no mercy,” Peshave told India-West from his home in London, where he is working towards his master’s in marketing at the University of Westminster. “It is absolutely right that Kasab got the death sentence.”

Peshave, however, also believes that Kasab was “a pawn in a chess game.” India and Pakistan must work together to find the plotters of the attacks, he said, adding, “Human security must be at a premium between the two countries.”

Peshave, then 28, saw a lone gunman entering the Shamiana on the evening of Nov. 26 and quickly signaled to his guests to start evacuating the facility as the gunman lobbed a hand grenade.

The 30 guests crawled towards the pool and began hiding in the bushes. One Canadian couple continued sitting at their table and Peshave said he wanted to scream at them to run, but was afraid he would give everyone else away in the process.

“It was the toughest decision I have ever made,” said Peshave, noting that the couple was killed by the gunman.

Peshave also snuck out at the pool, and hid there until he was approached by a woman whose 10-year-old son had gone to the bathroom before the attacks began, and had not yet been found. The young manager returned to the restaurant to try and find the boy, hiding in large planter boxes to avoid being spotted by attackers.

He was spotted by a gunman, who threw a hand grenade at him. “I knew I was done then,” said Peshave, adding that — as he waited for the grenade to explode — he thought of all the things he had not yet done.

Miraculously, the grenade did not go off. Peshave stayed in the planter box for another 20 minutes, until he was sure that the gunman had left. He returned to the poolside, and managed to evacuate his guests out of the hotel through the transformer room, and to Bombay Hospital, where several were treated for gunshot wounds.

Thirty-two people died at the Taj that night, including 17 of Peshave’s colleagues. For many months after he moved to London, the Pune native said he was haunted by the sound of ambulances, which brought back the carnage of that evening.

Peshave, who got married last year to Mrinalini Mishra, said he was astounded by the young age of the gunman. “He looked like a high school kid,” he said.

“Take away the gun and give him a backpack, and he would have looked like any typical teenager, going to college, having crushes on girls,” said Peshave.