Kasab among 10 gunmen who arrived by boat :Eyewitness

Another eyewitness on Wednesday identified arrested Pakistani gunman Mohammed Ajmal Kasab in a special court as one of the ten gunmen who arrived by boat at the city's shores on the night of November 26.

The evidence of this witness is considered crucial by the prosecution as he is the first independent eye-witness, a civilian, to have seen the ten gunmen arriving in the city before they carried out the terror strikes at different locations in south Mumbai.

Bharat Tamore, a foreman with Hotel Taj, said he had seen Kasab and others getting off a boat at the Fishermen's Colony in south Mumbai when he was going for his duty at around 2115 hours.

The witness said he got into an argument with two of the terrorists when he inquired about them.

The witness said that of the ten persons who came by the boat, eight alighted and started walking away while the remaining duo sailed off towards the nearby Nairman Point.

The persons were all in the age group of 20 to 25 years and were wearing orange life-jackets, he said.

He had asked two of the persons where they had come from and one of them replied they were students, the witness said.

Another person in the group asked what I had to do with it and the group walked away, he said.

The person who told him he was a student was short in height, the witness said, and when asked if he was present in the court he pointed at Kasab.

Kasab stood up and looked at the witness silently as he said the gunman was among the ten who claimed to be students.

The witness said he had identified Kasab in an earlier identification parade in Arthur Road Jail conducted by police.

The witness said, on November 26, he reported to duty at the Hotel Taj, one of the sites of the terror strikes, but on reaching there found that a shootout was on there between police and terrorists and took refuge in the basement.

The next day when he returned home he saw the police at the Fishermen's Colony talking about a rubber boat.

"I told them I had seen the boat and ten people getting off. Police then recorded my statement," he said.

The case of the prosecution is that the ten gunmen had left Karachi on a vessel Al-Hussaini and hijacked fishing vessel M V Kuber.

After reaching near the city's shore they killed the navigator of the vessel, Amarsingh Solanki, and sailed to the city's shores on a rubber inflatable boat.

In a related development, the rubber inflatable boat by which the gunmen arrived was produced in court by the prosecution for identification.

Another witness who is a fisherman by profession, Prashant Dhanu, identified the rubber boat as being the one which was abandoned at Nariman Point.

The witness said he and some associates had towed the boat and brought it to the police.

The rubber craft which was tied with ropes was lifted by three persons to display to the court as arrested gunman Kasab also looked on.

Kasab and two others have been charged with being involved in the November 26 terror strikes in Mumbai in which over 160 people were killed and over 200 injured.