Next, he was told to escort NSG commandos; he returned with bullet in his waist but no regretsThirty-four-year-old private security guard Rakesh Chawan is still unrepentant of the fact that he reported for duty on time at the Taj Hotel on November 27 despite knowing that the armed-to-the-teeth terrorists were creating havoc inside. “I was merely doing my duty,” says Chawan, who is recuperating at the Bombay Hospital . He winces regularly in pain because of the injury in his waist caused by the bullet fired by the same terrorist who shot NSG commando Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan. On Saturday, Chawan was blessed with a baby, his first child. Despite being aware that heavily armed terrorists had stormed the Taj Hotel on November 26, Chawan reported for duty at 9 am the next day. Soon, he was assigned to lead the team of 10 NSG commandos led by Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan. Chawan’s brief was simple: armed with a master key he was to open the doors of each and every room in the hotel’s old wing and then the commandos would take over. In case the rooms had guests then, they had to be escorted out to safety. But if it had terrorists, they had to be disarmed after a warning. It took about four hours for the commandos to comb every nook and corner of all the rooms on the fifth and sixth floors. “At 10.15 am, I and the commandos started combing the rooms from the sixth floor downwards. We encountered only guests in the rooms till we reached the fourth floor,” recalls Chawan, a Dombivli resident. “But as I opened room number 470, a terrorist was standing before us. He opened fire when a commando asked him to surrender. The first shot hit a commando and even as I ducked for safety, I could see from the corner of my eye that the terrorist kneeled and fired at me. I was hit,” recounts Chawan. He added that the commotion created while trying to convince an old lady to come out of her room located nearby may have alerted the terrorist. Meanwhile, the then bleeding Chawan was rushed to the hospital. The bullet that entered from behind was lodged in his pelvic region and he could feel it with his hands. Though the bullet has been removed now, the wound is healing very slowly. However, Chawan momentarily forgets his discomfort and breaks into a smile when he mentions that Ratan Tata had visited him in hospital when he was in the ICU. He adds thatThe Indian Hotels Company that runs the Taj Hotel is incurring all his medical expenses. Meanwhile, in the absence of his wife Rashmi, Chawan was being assisted by his maternal uncle Ashok Nalawade (58). Chawan, who is employed with MPI Security, says he is raring to join back.
