Delhi Lodhi Road accident: Hatchback hit by speeding BMW falls on homeless people, 2 kids dead

Police said that the FIR was registered on the complaint of Yatin Kishore Sharma, an 18-year-old who was driving the Wagon R.

A 27-year-old man the “speed and control” of his uncle’s new luxury car rammed a hatchback, causing it to flip and land on homeless people sleeping under the Lodhi Road flyover and killing two children earlier this week, the police said on Thursday after they arrested the suspect.

The seized car that the suspect was driving.

Eight people, including the four occupants of the car, were seriously injured in the incident, which took place around 4.30am, when the arrested driver, Sahil Narang, and his uncle were returning from the airport and heading towards Neela Gumbad in Nizamuddin.

The two children were identified as Roshni (6) and her brother Amir (10).

After hitting the hatchback — a Maruti Suzuki WagonR — the driver, identified as Sahil Narang, fled the spot in the car “so quickly”, according to eyewitnesses that neither the occupants of the other car nor people at spot spotted either the make or model of the offending vehicle. All they saw, the police said, was a black car speeding away.

The police pored over footage from over 200 CCTV cameras in a five to seven kilometre-radius of the spot to identify, and arrest, the offending vehicle. The police have neither disclosed Narang’s uncle’s name, nor have they arrested him. Narang runs a garment manufacturing business in Noida, the police said.

The police seized the damaged BMW from an authorised service centre in Noida, where Sahil had dropped it off for repairs.

“Narang and his uncle were coming from Delhi airport. Narang has revealed that the BMW car was newly purchased, so he was testing the speed and control of the car. During this course, he met with an accident. Narang has been booked for rash driving and causing death by negligence, a case regarding which was registered under the Indian Penal Code’s sections 279 and 304A at Hazrat Nizamuddin police station,” said deputy commissioner of police (southeast) Esha Pandey.

Police said that the FIR was registered on the complaint of Yatin Kishore Sharma, an 18-year-old who was driving the Wagon R.

In his complaint, Sharma said that around 4.30 am on June 10, he and three others were heading to Suryaa Hotel in New Friends Colony from Samrat Hotel in Chanakyapuri when a speeding black car coming from Lajpat Nagar hit their Wagon R car in its right side.

“The Wagon R car skidded, hit the concrete footpath and flipped onto people sleeping on it. Sharma and his friends were injured and trapped inside their damaged car. Local residents rescued occupants of the WagonR before informing the police,” said a police officer, quoting Sharma’s complaint.

Police said that apart from the four occupants of the car, six people sleeping on the footpath were also injured. All of them were rushed to AIIMS trauma centre, where the children were dead on arrival.

The team members scanned nearly 70 CCTV cameras installed on roads leading to Oberoi Hotel, Lodhi Road, Barapullah Road, Lajpat Rai Marg from the accident spot. One camera helped them find the vehicle going towards Neela Gumbad in Nizamuddin. The police then checked nearly 80 CCTVs on routes towards Zakir Hussain Marg, Sunder Nursery and Mathura Road.

“Video footage helped us ascertain that it was a luxury sedan and went towards Ashram after taking a turn towards Mathura Road. We scanned 60 more CCTVs installed around Nizamuddin East, Nizamuddin West and Jangpura B. Ultimately, the car was identified as a BMW and its registration number was also noticed. More cameras installed on the road in Maharani Bagh, New Friends Colony, CSIR building and on the Ring Road were checked,” the officer said.

Pandey said that the BMW was registered in the name of a person residing in east Delhi’s Krishna Nagar. The owner’s house was raided and during his questioning, he disclosed that he had given the car to his nephew, Sahil Narang, to get it serviced at a workshop in Noida Sector 62.

“Thereafter, Narang was arrested from his home in Nirman Vihar and the BMW was seized from the repair centre,” she added.

Police said that the Wagon R car was badly damaged and they had to use a crane to remove it from the accident spot and take it to the police station for mechanical inspection for the purpose of investigation in the case. Apart from Sharma, his friend Samridhi, Sahaj and Tushar Arora were also injured in the accident.

Among the four homeless people who were injured in the accident, the police have identified two -- Mustafa and his wife Kavita.