As 15-hour ordeal ends, the pain begins

But after seven hours and a round of several city hospitals from KEM, Sion, Bhabha, Cooper, Nanavati, Hinduja and Holy Family, the name ‘Ranjan Naik’ was not on any list—injured/ in ICU/ dead.

Finally, Vaigankar gets a photograph and starts looking at the unidentified bodies piled across the morgues.

At 4.10 pm, Vaigankar, accompanied by Anjan’s brother-in-law and colleagues, makes another trip to the Information Centre at Sion Hospital to view a series of bloody images, each appended with a number. But they do not find any face resembling Rajan’s.

‘‘Perhaps his body has been mutilated beyond recognition,’’ says friend P Rathod.

Heading in an uncertain direction, they decide to take a last look at photographic prints of the dead at the police counter set up to deal with procedures following the identification of a body.

Going through them, Ranjan’s brother-in-law looks at the photo of Body No. 28 for a long time—it is badly disfigured—and says: ‘‘That is him.’’ The inspector compares a passport photo of Ranjan with the photo taken by the hospital, and asks the group to go in and see the body.

Maharashtra Navnirman Sena founder Raj Thackeray arrives, and Ranjan’s friends have to push their way through the crowds. After over 20 minutes, they emerge moist-eyed. Ranjan is Body No. 28.