Day: Thursday
Date: October 19, 2000
Time: Between 7 pm and 7.30 pm

It was supposed to be a simple evening outing to attend a wedding.

Teja Ram, then 38, a resident of Kotla village in Rupnagar district, was excited to take his friend Surjit Singh to a wedding in Kiratpur Sahib town, around 6.5 kilometres away. Surjit’s young son Kalu, around nine or 10 years old, climbed into the van, wearing a white half-sleeved school shirt and shorts.

Before leaving, the duo asked their common friend Muni Lal, a halwai from the village who was also in his late 30s, to accompany them.

The four left in Teja Ram’s second-hand Maruti Omni van, which he had bought barely six weeks earlier.

“He used to drive a truck earlier, because of which he remained away from home for nearly six months at a stretch. So he decided to spend more time with the family and purchased a second-hand van to drive within the state,” Bhupinder Singh, Teja Ram’s son, told The Indian Express.

Bhupinder was only seven years old then.

He still remembers the atmosphere inside the house that evening.

“My sister was nine years old and my younger brother was five. Karwa Chauth had passed on October 16 that year and Ahoi Ashtami was on October 20. Preparations were going on at home and my father had brought many eatables for the fast. Some gifts had to be sent to our bua’s house the next day. He had told us that he himself would go and deliver them as festivals like Dussehra and Diwali were approaching. But who knew that it was his last meeting with us,” he said.

The men never returned home that night.

Initially, the families assumed the wedding celebrations had delayed them. Driving late at night was uncommon then and relatives believed they would return the next morning.

But morning turned into afternoon, with no trace of them.

“My mother and other family members thought they might have stayed back because they were told not to drive late at night. But when there was no information even the next day, the whole village started searching for them,” Bhupinder recalled.

Around 2 km from Kotla village, residents noticed tyre marks near the edge of the 32-foot-deep Bhakra canal, suggesting that a vehicle may have plunged into the water.

“The canal remained full to the brim throughout the year. A search operation began immediately. In those days, there were very limited facilities and divers could go only up to 16 feet deep. Canal authorities even lowered the water level by around five feet from the source,” he said.

The families of Teja Ram, Surjit Singh and Muni Lal pooled together nearly Rs 2.5 lakh by selling land to continue the search. Villagers also contributed money so that the operation could continue several kilometres downstream.

But nothing was found.

“Eventually, we assumed they were no more and performed all rituals as advised by priests. But every day we still hoped that perhaps our father would return, or maybe someone had kidnapped them,” Bhupinder said.

A year later, Teja Ram’s widow Lakhbir Kaur married his younger brother Gurnam Singh with the consent of both families, a customary arrangement in some rural families to support widows and children.

The family survived on limited agricultural land. Lakhbir Kaur began growing vegetables while Gurnam Singh started driving taxis, much like his elder brother once had.

The three children eventually grew up and settled into their own lives. Today, Bhupinder runs a computer café in Rupnagar, younger brother Paramjit Singh serves in the Indian Army and sister Mamta Rani is married.

Lakhbir and Gurnam never had children together.

Nearly 25 years later, an unexpected clue surfaced.

About six months ago, Bhupinder came across an underwater video uploaded by professional diver Kamalpreet Singh Saini, who is known in the Anandpur Sahib region for retrieving bodies and vehicles from canals.

In the footage, Saini had accidentally spotted a rusted van lying deep inside the Bhakra canal near Nakkian village, around 2 km from Kotla.

Day: Saturday
Date: May 17, 2026
Time: Around 11 am to 2 pm

Saini organised a recovery operation after making detailed preparations to pull the vehicle out.

What followed was a painstaking three-hour exercise.

The vehicle was secured underwater with ropes. The other end was fastened to a eucalyptus tree on the canal bank. An excavator and tractor were stationed outside while Saini’s team pulled from above. Underwater, Saini carefully monitored the movement.

“Saini had posted an underwater video where he accidentally found a rusted van at the base of the canal. I contacted him immediately because our father’s van had also fallen into the canal near that location,” Bhupinder said.

Saini later described the delicate retrieval process.

“We had to ensure the doors stayed closed so that nothing from inside moved out. The rear portion of the vehicle had been badly damaged but the front seats were intact and closed. The vehicle was finally pulled out on Sunday afternoon. Families of Muni Lal and Teja Ram, along with many villagers, were present there,” he said.

Inside the rusted shell were fragments of lives frozen in time.

A small sodden white school shirt belonging to a child around eight or nine years old was recovered, with a few bones still inside it. Near the driver’s seat, more bones and a kurta were found.

Then came the final confirmation: the vehicle’s registration certificate, wrapped carefully in multiple layers of polythene.

“The RC was the final proof that the vehicle belonged to my father,” Bhupinder said.

For the families, the discovery reopened grief buried decades ago but also brought a measure of closure.

Though the last rites had already been performed in 2000, the recovered belongings were immersed at Kiratpur Sahib according to rituals, followed by an ardas at the village gurdwara.

“We were advised this by priests. Now we will go to Haridwar again,” family members said.

Muni Lal’s family, which had sold his sweet shop after his disappearance, finally garlanded his photograph on Sunday after the van was recovered.

Surjit Singh’s widow died a few years ago. His daughter is married and no longer remains in touch with the village. Kalu, who had accompanied his father that evening, also died in the accident.

Through it all, Saini refused to accept any payment.

“It’s a very rare incident. I am glad we could trace a 26-year-old vehicle and help these families,” he said.

Saini, 35, has worked as a professional diver since 2013.

“I worked with a private company in Puducherry between 2010 and 2012 and later returned to Anandpur Sahib after my mother fell ill. Though I wanted to go abroad, circumstances forced me to stay back. That day, it took us nearly three hours to pull the vehicle out. Till now, I have retrieved over 1,500 bodies, more than 80 cars, nearly 150 motorcycles and around 20 mobile phones. I also catch snakes in rural areas during the monsoon,” he said.

The remains of the rusted van have now been given to a scrap dealer free of cost.

But for Bhupinder, something much heavier surfaced from the canal that day.

“No doubt we remember our father every day. But after the vehicle was found, we finally got some peace. Let all the souls rest in peace,” he said before falling silent.