Amritpal Singh used abandoned Ladowal railway bridge to enter Ludhiana
Deepkamal Kaur
Phillaur (Jalandhar) March 23
On Saturday when the Punjab Police, during the chase of Amritpal Singh, sounded the alert, the fugitive managed to hoodwink nearly 100 policemen deployed at the police naka and the Ladowal toll plaza to cross over to Ludhiana.
Having failed to pre-empt that Amritpal could go on a bike in a new avtar using the old and abandoned Ladowal railway bridge, just 150 m away from the highway passage, the police had not deployed any force on that side. Crossing the road from the Phillaur side towards this old bridge via a kutcha passage, he skipped both naka as well as toll plaza. The hi-tech naka is equipped with HD cameras directly linked to the office of the SSP, Jalandhar rural.
Bikers in the area use the old bridge to cross over whenever there is more rush at the toll plaza. Despite that, the police paid no heed.
After he and his accomplice Pappalpreet Singh of Kathu Nangal dumped the bike at Darapur village (Phillaur), they reached Sheikhupur riding another bike of a local youth. At Sheikhupur, they entered a gurdwara at 6:50 pm. He reached out to the family of granthi Sukhwinder Singh.
Granthi Sukhwinder said, “I was not at home that time. Since I cannot make enough income from gurdwara, I also run a parallel business of DJ and lighting system. I had gone to Goraya taking my system for a jagrata (religious programme). My wife, two sons, aged 19 and 17, and daughter were there when Amritpal came over. None of them recognised him to be Amritpal and treated him like any other devotee. My wife served them tea. My younger son was about to make a call to me sitting in front of them, but they pointed to the concealed weapons inside their shirts to dissuade him from making any call to me.”
He further said, “Threatening him, they started giving him directions and my son did as directed by them. He took out a bike and on their insistence to drop them to the Sutlej riverside. Since the boats were not allowed after 6 pm to cross the river, they directed him to take the bike to old Ladowal bridge and dropped them near Hardy’s World, an adventure point, across the river in Ludhiana and came back after dropping them.”
On the run since Saturday
- Amritpal started from his place at Jallupur Khera (Amritsar) in five cars on Saturday morning
- The police was to arrest him at Harike but he changed his route to cross Moga via Goindwal-Sultanpur Lodhi-Moga passage
- He crossed Chak Bahmanian toll (between Shahkot in Jalandhar & Dharamkot in Moga) at 11:47 am
- Seeing a naka ahead, he took a U-turn from toll changing from Mercedes to Brezza
- The convoy moved towards Bajwa Kalan village flyover in Shahkot. All vehicles in his convoy went towards Bulandpuri gurdwara but Amritpal’s Brezza went to Nangal Ambian (Shahkot)
- From there, he left at 1: 45 pm via Nurmahal road. He took Platina bike with Pappalpreet. Bike developed snag and he dumped it at Darapur village (Phillaur)
- They took another bike & reached Sheikhupur village (Phillaur) at 6:46 pm. On bike of granthi’s son, he crossed the Sutlej through an abandoned railway bridge between Phillaur and Ladowal
- He was dropped near Hardy’s World (Ludhiana). From there, he took a truck to reach Haryana
- On Sunday, he spent night on Kurukshetra and left the place the next day
