13 years after the German Bakery blast the cafe runs smoothly while victims await justice

After more than a decade of suffering following the blasts that rocked Pune's popular cafe, a German Bakery branch has opened up in Bandra West, Mumbai. The victims of the blast, however, are still awaiting justice. 

Also known as the 2010 Pune Bombing, the blast marked the first ever terror attack jointly executed by the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and the Indian Mujahideen (IM) on February 13, 2010 at Pune's German Bakery.

It killed 18 people, and injured at least 60 more, including an Italian woman, two Sudanese students and an Iranian student.

Later Smita Kharose, daughter of the founder, had reopened the bakery in 2013 in a low key fashion. Kharose renovated the eatery famous among foreigners at an estimated cost of ₹1.5 crore.

Popular among the youth, the ambience of the eatery draws huge crowds but now has a tight security system that includes a metal detector, more than one dozen of 16 CCTV cameras and tens of guards.

The Maharashtra state Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) had arrested Bhatkal alias Mohammad Ahmad Sidibappa on March 13, 2014 on charges of planting a bomb inside the famous bakery located on the North Main road in the upmarket Koregaon Park area.

Besides Bhatkal, conspirator Mirza Himayat Inayat Baig was arrested in September, 2010 -- the ATS seized 1200 gms of RDX from him. It was the first major terrorist attack since the 2008 Mumbai attacks and created widespread fear and panic in the country.