A Mother Who Never Returned: 33 Years On, Mumbai Blast Survivor Still Waits f ...
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[*]Priti Deshmukh, 38, was killed in the Century Bazar blast while returning home after delivering chapatis to a canteen in South Mumbai.
[*]The co-ordinated serial bomb blast killed 297 people and injured more than 700.
[*]Three decades later, key accused remain absconding, leaving many victim families feeling justice is incomplete.
Tushar Deshmukh was 13, studying in class 7 at Dadar's Dr Antonio Da Silva High School. On March 12, 1993, his mother Priti Deshmukh, 38 stepped out of the house at 10 am. She went to Jindal canteen in South Mumbai to deliver chapatis. She didn’t wake up Tushar, who was sleeping when she stepped out for work, as she planned to come home early that day, but never returned. Her completely burnt mortal remains reached home late evening when Mumbai was shattered with 1993 serial bomb blasts.
After delivering chapatis, Priti left the canteen. She reached Haji Ali bus stop, boarded bus number 85 to reach home early. At around 1 pm, when the bus reached the Century Bazar bus stop, a taxi full of RDX parked nearby exploded. Everybody who had boarded the bus, including Priti,was killed in that deadly attack.
Tushar, his grandmother Sumati, father Pradeep and neighbours got anxious when Priti didn’t reach home by the afternoon. The family started searching for her. “We all were thinking, she didn’t return home in time because she might be helping blast victims, because by that time news of the serial blasts started coming in, but later in the evening werushed to KEM Hospital. She wasn’t there in the injury ward, where hundreds of blast victims who had survived were undergoingtreatment. My mama (maternal uncle) found her in the mortuary.” Tushar told Outlook.
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Priti’s body, like several others, was too burnt to be identified. Her brother identified it with a small piece of saree stuck to her body, said Tushar.
“I saw herbody in pieces, packed in a plastic sheet. I was very young, so my family didn’t allow me to perform the last rites. I couldn’t see my mother's smiling face ever again. Every day, she used to bid me goodbye while leaving for work. On the day of the blast, she didn’t disturb me by waking me up as I was sleeping. I couldn’t meet my mother for one last time before she was killed in the blast, I grew up with her memories, ” says Tushar.
Priti was a self-made woman who overcame several challenges, includinga dysfunctional family. She helped her husband Pradeep repay loans by delivering chapatis to canteens and tailoring work etc. She endured domestic abuse at home by her husband, yet she was determined to take care of her husband and child. She used to love singing, dancing, and helping peoplein distress. She also helped victims ofthe 1992 riots in Mumbai. Her son Tushar has hundreds of her memories to share, living with the wound that refuses to heal.
The day Priti died in a blast, she planned to come home early, spend time with her son Tushar and leave for Pune the next day to visit a relative. That visit never happened, the relatives she meant to visit, had to come for her funeral.
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