A Soldier’s Wish

Paralysed because of the Oberoi rescue operation of 26/11, he wants to see the hotel again

When the 26/11 attacks were happening in Mumbai, PV Manesh was one of the NSG commandos airdropped into the Trident Oberoi. He spent 24 hours inside, battling terrorists until a grenade fell near him. Now paralysed along his right side, he harbours a wish: to see the hotel again.

Manesh says he wants to do it because he is not able to recollect anything about the hotel. It was dark when he entered and he was unconscious when being taken out. He had dropped, as he remembers, into ‘a pool of blood’ on the terrace. He recalls the room-by-room search that began from the top floor. On the 22nd floor, he almost came face to face with one of the terrorists and shot him down. Within minutes, Manesh too was hit—by the grenade. “We rescued 42 inmates trapped inside their rooms. Many of them were foreigners .When we broke open the doors, we saw inmates huddled in corners with terrified faces,” he says.

After the grenade went off, shrapnel fell on his head. He had his helmet on, but it went right through it. “I woke up four days later, only to realise that the right side of my body was paralysed,” he says. He was in a Kolkata hospital for one year after that. He slowly regained mobility, aided by Ayurvedic treatment. Two pieces of sharpnel have been removed, but one still remains lodged inside. “It is in the left side, on the back of my head. Doctors said it would be risky if we try to remove it,” he says. He can walk now, though his right arm and fingers still remain motionless. Manesh is now posted at the 122 TA Battalion in his home town Kannur in Kerala.

He now wants to jog his memory of 26/11. “I saw the video of the commando operation on the internet after months. On that occasion, I hardly noticed anything other than the movements of terrorists inside,” he says.

Manesh had made a couple of personal visits to Mumbai before 26/11, but never saw the Oberoi Trident then. “I want to go to Mumbai again to see the Oberoi. Not in the uniform of a commando, but with my wife and child,” he says.

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