Witnesses said the attackers fired automatic weapons apparently at random and made no effort to hide their identities. Experts said this suggested the attackers were prepared to die.
About midnight, more than two hours after the serial attacks began, television images from near the historic Metro Cinema showed journalists and spectators ducking for cover as gunshots rang out.
Police released a picture of a man with a serene smile wearing a blue T-shirt and holding an automatic weapon whom they identified as one of the attackers at the railway station.
At the Taj Mahal Palace hotel, firefighters used trucks to help people out of windows as other crews battled blazes on the roof. Bystanders used ornate gold-colored luggage trolleys to move bodies.
"I guess they were after foreigners because they were asking for British or American passports," said Rakesh Patel, a Briton who who was staying at the Taj Mahal on business. "They had bombs."
Patel said two young men armed with a rifle and a machine gun took 15 people hostage, forcing them to the hotel roof. He and four others slipped away in the confusion and smoke of the upper floors, he said.
The attack comes at a sensitive time for India and the region. Five Indian states are holding elections now, and a national vote is expected early next year. The opposition Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party has accused Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's Congress Party of being soft on terrorism.
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