But when they went to offer assistance to the injured person, a young man in a white shirt, bandana and a black shoulder bag, shot at them forcing them to flee.
“I ran back up stairs to get the policeman so that we could fight this man but to my surprise the police man had also fled from where he was hiding,” said Singh.
When they got upstairs, Singh and his friend pushed about 30 people inside the Books First store and then asked the security guards to pull the shutters down to protect them from being seen.
After a brief period, the group moved to the Movie Theatre and placed their phones on silent mode.
But soon enough the terrorists had reached the first floor and the group had to think of a fast way out.
“From one of the windows, we saw two more attackers coming to where we were and they were standing outside Books First. These ones had bandanas on their heads and were shooting at random and so we had to move,” he explained.
The fire exits at the movie theatre provided a quick way of escaping.
But someone had to scout it and make sure that it was safe for everyone. Singh and one of the Java waiters took up the challenge and gave the rest of the civilians the green light.
“We went all the way to the terrace but the doors could not be locked from the outside. So we took some heavy construction equipment that we found on the terrace to barricade the door to prevent the attackers from coming up to where we were,” he revealed.
But even as they made their way to the terrace, more drama awaited them. Police officers started shooting at them.
“We were asking for help from people who were at the bottom but some police officers started shooting at us thinking we were terrorists,” he said.
“A bullet missed one of the waiters by inches and so we decided to just sit down there quietly and pray for help.”
Eventually, help came through when police officers who had used the Java fire escape found them on the terrace.
Singh and others had to carry those who were injured as the armed police officers kept vigil.
“We had to put injured people on our shoulders to take them to the ambulances which were trying to get in. There were also small children that we carried because they were in shock,” he said.
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