Podcast | Editor's Pick of the Day - 26/11 Mumbai attacks: The cost of terror strike that rocked the nation

Large-scale terror attacks are intended to make statements. When two fuel filled passenger jets rammed into the heart of New York on September 11 in 2001, they took with them two iconic World Trade buildings and left a gaping hole in the skyline of the city and left its economic nerve-centre smarting with pain and horror.

Mumbai has suffered terror attacks upon its business districts, on its railway network but the most devastatingly symbolic and eviscerating attack was when ten years ago, ten Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorists sailed into the city from Karachi and held its citizens hostage by carrying out 12 coordinated shooting and bombing attacks lasting four days. The attacks began on Wednesday 26 November and lasted until Saturday 29 November 2008 leaving in their wake, devastation and disbelief. At least 174 people died (including 9 attackers) and more than 300 were wounded.

The definitive image of the tragedy beamed around the world was that of the dome of the Taj Mahal hotel, engulfed in black smoke, proving that the choice of the target was not incidental. Neither was the cold-blooded attack on Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus, the life-line of Mumbaikars on the move. There was also Leopold Cafe, a place for seamless, cross-cultural intermingling and the Oberoi Trident, another hospitality landmark. The attacks on Cama Hospital and Nariman House, a Jewish community centre were also part of strategy to disempower a city that is known to dust itself and go about the business of life after every blow to its sense of normalcy

On the tenth anniversary of the 26/11 attacks on Mumbai, we will try to revisit what these days of unmitigated horror cost the city and its citizens.