David Coleman Headley on Tuesday deposed before the Mumbai court that he had also carried out surveillance of other important sites in the city such as the naval air station, Siddhivinayak temple and state police headquarters etc at the behest of Lashkar-e-Tayyaba (LeT).
He also deposed about various operations planned by LeT in Mumbai prior to the 26/11 attack, but those plans were not executed for various reasons. One such plan was to attack a conference hall in the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel during a meet of Indian scientists there. However, he said the plan was called off as the LeT could not arrange logistics for it.
Headley said he was specifically asked to survey Siddhivinayak temple as a target. He also said the naval air station and state police headquarters of Maharashtra were amongst the targets but these plans were not executed.
Headley also said he visited Mumbai for the first time in 2006 and at that time he was not given any specific targets to recce and was asked to take general videos and pictures of places in Mumbai. “(This was) To set up office and make my cover authenticated so that I could stay there (in Mumbai) and I could do surveillance,” he said.
“I surveyed multiple targets as well as selected landing sites,” said Pakistani-American Headley who is an approver in the 2008 Mumbai attacks case.
According to Headley, a meeting was held between him, Abu Kahafa and Sajid Mir at the headquarters of Lashkar-e-Tayyaba in Muzafarrabad. This meeting was held somewhere in November or December 2007 in which Headley was assigned the task of conducting recce of Hotel Taj and specifically its convention hall on the second floor because they had information that a conference of Indian scientists was to be held there soon.
When LeT planned to attack the Taj’s conference hall, Headley said he surveyed the hotel many times and when he gave them videos and pictures in this regard they were satisfied that he had fulfilled his task.
However, due to numerous reasons they cancelled that plan. When advocate Ujjwal Nikam asked him the exact reason for cancelling the plan to attack the Taj, he said, “The plan was cancelled mostly due to logistic problems.” He explained that by logistic problems he meant getting personnel and weaponry.
Headley also surveyed and shot videos of Hotel Oberoi and the entire street of Shaheed Bhagat Singh Marg at Colaba where Leopold Café (one of the places that were targeted by terrorists during the 26/11 attacks) and Chabad House (Nariman House, another target) are located.
