NEARLY three weeks after a truck cleaner, Inderjeet Singh, was murdered, police have pieced together and solved, so they say, the crime.
Inderjeet’s body was recovered from near the Markfed office, Sector 35, on December 5 morning. The accused in the case was Gurmeet Singh, a Jalalabad resident, who was the former employee of the company for which Inderjeet was working. Gurmeet Singh was nabbed yesterday.
It was suspected that Gurmeet Singh had also tried to murder Buta Singh (the truck driver) and fled away with Rs 3.5 lakh in cash. Buta and Inderjeet Singh had collected this as payment for the company, Kisanfed, of which they both were employees.
Buta Singh has now spilled the beans before the police.
Police had already found out that Gurmeet Singh, who belongs to a below-middle class family, was planning to go to Thailand. Inquiries further revealed that Gurmeet Singh had got a passport made in his name and had also got a valid Visa for Thailand.
Where did he get the money for all this? ‘‘The question was enough to raise suspicion in our minds. We started looking for him and finally nabbed him at Nawanshehar yesterday,’’ said a senior police official.
Gurmeet’s interrogation revealed that the motive for murder was his desire to go abroad. According to police, Gurmeet was sacked from his job in April this year. He was thrown out over accusations of having bungled money from the purchases made by the company.
He went to New Delhi, met an agent, took details for getting a visa for going abroad and returned to Jalalabad. From there, he went to Nawanshehar, inquired from the company about the truck on December 3. Gurmeet came to know that the truck was going to Jalalabad.
Gurmeet met Buta Singh at the place, from where the payment was to be collected. He asked for a lift. Driver Buta and cleaner Inderjeet agreed. Buta and Inderjeet were supposed to come to Mohali for collecting some chemicals. Gurmeet insisted on accompanying them to Mohali. On the way, Buta and Inderjeet consumed alcohol. When they stopped for dinner near the Balongi barrier on December 3 night, Gurmeet mixed sleeping pills in their food and drove the truck to Chandigarh.
When he reached Sector 35, Gurmeet hit Inderjeet with a cement slab lying on the road. After killing Inderjeet, he picked up a cutter and inflicted a sharp injury on Buta Singh’s throat. Assuming that both Buta and Inderjeet were dead, Gurmeet fled to Delhi with the cash. After reaching Delhi, he spent a portion of the money on gold jewellery, mobile phone and clothes. He deposited the rest in a bank account held by one of his relatives.