INSIDENE EXCLUSIVE - DRIVER PARAG's MOTHER ADMITS CRIME; GIRLS NOT PICKED UP FROM BELTOLA

INSIDENE EXCLUSIVE

Bhupender Singh alias Geego’s gruesome murder was not pre-planned but planned on the spot on the night of Uruka (Assamese Bihu Celebration) in Guwahati after the driver of the Toyota Innova AS 01 AM 7695 Parag Phukan and two other unidentified girls seated one in the front and one in the back hit Bhupender and dragged his dangling body down the road before ramming the left hand side of the vehicle on to an electric post leaving the victim half dead on the road only to succumb to his injuries the next day.

It was widely circulated that the incident was of a hit & run case but pressure from media, family members of the next of the kin and friends who voiced their anger and anguish via social media platforms, finally led the police to recover the vehicle from a garage in Geetanagar and subsequently arrested Parag Phukan who not only confessed to the crime but also gave an intricate details of the happenings of that night about how he took permission from the owner of the vehicle Pradip Deka to go back home citing non availability of transport and later picked up two girls at midnight near an intersection at Beltola who requested lift till GNRC to visit an ailing patient.

According to Parag in his confession, the lift was purely on humanitarian consideration. However Parag didn’t answer why he didn’t allow both the girls to take the back seat instead of one in the front. Eyewitnesses of the case who immediately identified Parag after his arrest by police had informed that the girl in the front seat was also responsible for the crime since she had steered the wheel towards Bhupender while Parag pressed the accelerator in a bid to avoid the public mostly youngsters who had punched Parag for fighting with the driver of the truck blocking the road. Thereafter Parag kept changing his statement and at one point informed about hitting Bhupender while reversing the vehicle, the claim which was out rightly rejected by a team of FSL experts when police tried to recreate the scene of crime.

This is when INSIDENE decided to investigate the matter and reached Hullal Village of North Lakhimpur and spoke to Parag’s parents Hira Nath Phukan a retired army jawan and Kabita Phukan. It must be noted that Kabita Phukan, mother of Parag was in Guwahati on the day of the murder.

Speaking to INSIDENE, Kabita Phukan said,” Just after the accident, my son came to me and I could see him shivering. He fell on my lap and started weeping and narrated the entire incident. He brought the vehicle along. We are poor people and we were terrified. I kept cursing my son for his negligence and immature behaviour. He confessed before me about hitting the man who had at first with some of his friends tried to attack Parag”.

“My son never picked up any girls from the Beltola area and that the two drunk girls were in his vehicle from the starting point of his journey back home. I seriously don't know why he is hiding this fact. The reputation of our family is now at stake. Nobody is on our side except god. After higher secondary Parag undertook a 3 months driver’s training program at Kulimali Lakhimpur but couldn’t get a drivers job as he was yet to perfect his driving skills. His elder brother is also a driver here at Panigaon. However a close family friend took him to Meghalaya where he joined as a cook plus driver in Star Cement company. Driving inside the campus for loading and unloading cement bags, he became an expert and later left the job and came back home. I still remember the day when he gave us 17 thousand rupees to repair the old house and change the galvanized sheets with new ones. After that he left for Guwahati” said Kabita Phukan.

Kabita Phukan further reiterated that in Guwahati Parag got support from his eldest sister Gitali Phukan who earned her living by selling Oriflame products door to door and took up bridal makeup and massage works. She left Lakhimpur after she became a widow. Her son stays with us. Parag first drove a Xylo vehicle for almost 3 years and later joined the present owner of the Innova, Pradip Deka in 2016. Since then he never visited Lakhimpur permanently and in between his service with the present owner, he married a girl from Nagaon and settled permanently in Guwahati. My son is innocent. He wasn't drunk on the day of the incident".