Noida Techie's Car Pulled Out 3 Days After It Fell Into Pit, May Offer Vital Clues

The Grand Vitara driven by 27-year-old software engineer Yuvraj Mehta, which veered off the road and landed in a water-filled construction pit amid dense fog in the early hours of Saturday, has finally been recovered. 

A crane pulled out the grey SUV, much of it covered in weeds, from the 20-foot-deep pit in Noida's Sector 150 on Tuesday evening. 

Visuals showed that the bonnet of the car was open and crumpled and the nose was crushed, indicating the front collided with something. This could be a result of the car hitting the barrier of a drain, which separates the road from the pit, before falling in. 

The sunroof of the SUV was also open and officials said Mehta may have used either that or the shattered windshield to escape the vehicle. 

One of Mehta's friends, Pankaj Tokas, told NDTV that the software engineer had a dashcam installed in the car, footage from which could give the police crucial clues as they attempt to reconstruct the events of the night. 

Around 12.30 am on Saturday, Mehta, who works for a firm in Gurugram, was headed home to his apartment complex, Tata Eureka Park, in Sector 150.

It was a road he must have taken hundreds of times, but a dense fog that night meant visibility was very low. Just as he was taking the final, nearly 90-degree turn about 800 metres from his home, the Grand Vitara jumped two barriers around a drain between the road and the pit, and fell into the water.

Having made it out of the car, Mehta, who did not know how to swim, made a call to his father, who immediately reached the spot. Mehta's father was joined, in stages, by teams from the police, fire brigade and the State Disaster Response Force (SDRF), but the fog was so thick that the 27-year-old could not be located. He drowned 90 minutes later.

The pit had been dug for the construction of the basement area of a mall in 2021. Construction activity stopped and water accumulated there the next year, remaining that way since.

After Mehta's death, a First Information Report (FIR) was filed against two builders - Wishtown Planners and Lotus Greens - based on a complaint by his father. Lotus Greens later claimed that they had sold the project in 2019-2020 to Wishtown Planners Pvt Ltd and the Grihapravesh Group.

On Tuesday, police said they have arrested Abhay Kumar, one of the owners of Wishtown Planners, and are looking for the other owner, Manish Kumar.

After widespread outrage and allegations of negligence following the drowning, Noida Authority CEO Lokesh M was also removed from his post on Monday.