After hitting Fauja, owner hid SUV, used bike

As the police looked for him for nearly 30 hours, Amritpal Singh Dhillon (26), who was driving the SUV when it hit 114-year-old marathoner Fauja Singh, hid his Fortuner car in the garage of his plush house at Dasupur village of Kartarpur sub-tehsil here. Since the fateful Monday afternoon, he was only using his bike.

Dhillon, an NRI based in Canada, knew that he had hit an elderly man, but it was late in the night that he came to know that the legendary marathoner had been killed in the accident. Since he was the third buyer of the Fortuner SUV, whose record had not been updated, he was not expecting the police to nab him so soon.

He was arrested from his house on Tuesday evening. A huge team of Jalandhar Rural Police, including SSP Harvinder S Virk, SPs Sarabjit Rai and Parminder S Heer, DSP Adampur Kulwant Singh, Inspectors Hardevpreet Singh and Pushp Bali, had been working on all possible leads in the high-profile case.

“He used several means to dodge us but we took this case as a challenge. After hitting Fauja Singh, Dhillon had left the highway and took country lanes to reach his house. Due to this reason, we could not get much footage, but whatever images we got were conclusive. Reaching his house, he quickly hid his Fortuner in the garage and kept it covered. The area near the left headlight of the vehicle had been damaged, but he chose not to get it repaired. Since the accident occurred, he was using his bike and was casually going around," said SSP Virk.

The SSP shared the details of the evidence that led to Dhillon’s arrest. “The broken parts of the SUV that had fallen at the accident site helped us identify the vehicle. We had to struggle to trace Dhillon, as he was not the first buyer of the SUV. We took the broken parts to a Toyota agency to figure out the model of the vehicle, which was found to be from 2009. It was finally in the insurance records of this Fortuner that the phone number of Dhillon was found. We used the record of the phone number to trace him. Once we reached his house, he confessed to the crime."

During interrogation, the accused told the police that he had returned to India on an emergency certificate on June 23 last. He had lost his Indian passport in Canada, owing to which he had to return. A plus-two pass youth, he had gone to Canada on a tourist visa but had managed to get a work permit there. His permit is valid till 2027 and he was doing labour work there.

Dhillon’s family, including his mother and three sisters, are in Canada. He had lost his father some time ago. Since his return, he has been getting his house repaired. He owns about 12 acres of agricultural land. The police have confirmed that he had no criminal background. He was on Wednesday presented in a court and sent to judicial remand.

Punjab