A healthy and happy family of Karambir Singh Kang, the G.M. of Mumbai Taj Hotel met its tragic end on 26th November 2008 when the terrorists attacked and killed nearly 200 people in the city. GM of Taj Hotel at Mumbai is really a coveted and jealous post for any managerial incumbent. A Punjabi by birth must have really enjoyed his tenure with unlimited perks and privileges in the post and premier property of Taj Group.
Tragedy visits an individual or a family without any prior warning. It never allows an event to alter the visiting devastation into a positive and lucky ending always. Only a few do qualify in such a situation either by sheer stroke of luck or with a shrewd planning for an emergency escape. Is it the fate’s success or the man’s failure or both? I think it is both but the latter can ensure the former’s defeat provided the victim concerned reaches a cool-headed thought and ensures its timely implementation in quick succession. Unfortunately this was missing in the family and friend circle or colleagues of Kang.
Look at Srinivasan’s tragedy ending in flawless escape from the same hotel’s third floor after a similar ordeal in inferno and awful atrocity enacted by terrorists on that fateful night. A Chartered Accountant by profession checked in the hotel a few minutes before the entry of law-breakers instead of a different accommodation normally availed of by him in his earlier visits to the city. A constant touch with his close friends soon after the entry and the commotion created in the neighbourhood and the follow-up action he adopted on their sincere advice over the mobile phone and on his own commonsense dictated by his senses and reflexes enabled him to escape with the vigilant and venerative action of fire-brigade personnel.
May be GM Kang was busy elsewhere without any staff being able to contact him and make him feel the gravity of the situation as it was unfurling in the full view of other catering and security staff present on duty at that hour. He was perhaps physically and mentally not alert to perceive the enormity of the scenario and accordingly alert his wife and evacuate the family despite the full knowledge of the building’s layout and the familiar staff available on the spot at that point of time within the campus.
How would anyone else explain the enigmatic turn of events indicating the possibility of family shifting in a few days to a different location in the city and getting an admission to the younger son in a good school in the new locale but forcing Kang to not only lose his beloved wife and the fortunate children but also their belongings except laptop and a mobile in toto without leaving a trace of their relationship or memory in this mundane world. What an irony? It is not a natural disaster. It is only a man-made disaster made possible by a terror attack and a terrific lapse on the part of the head of the family. He was closer to the family in the same building occupying the highest position on the spot and having all the where-withal of the powerful and plumb posting at his command but all this came to naught in his case.
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