As one of the alleged Bondi Beach gunmen lay dying beneath the restraints of a Kiwi bystander, a police officer looked at the young hero and told him: “Stay calm and don’t let go.”
Amandeep Singh-Bola was among several ordinary people who rushed on to a footbridge being used by the father-son duo alleged to have killed 15 people and injured 40 more in a suspected terror attack targeting a Hanukkah celebration at the Sydney beach suburb on Sunday.
Singh-Bola, who is from Papakura but has lived in Australia for almost seven years, could be seen in footage sitting on the back of Sajid Akram after the 50-year-old and his 24-year-old son Naveed Akram were shot, bringing the massacre to an end.
“He was dying, when I got on him,” Singh-Bola told Michael Morrah on Herald NOW.
“It was just the one young [police] officer there. He looked at me and said, ‘Just stay calm. Hold on to him’.
“You might not see it in the video, but I was shouting that he’s hurt … and I thought he was dying and [the policeman] just told me to stay calm and said, ‘Don’t let go. Don’t let go’.”
He could “see it in his eyes” when Sajid Akram died, Singh-Bola told Morrah.
The other alleged gunman – who survived and is facing 59 charges, including 15 counts of murder, and charges of committing a terrorist act and wounding with intent to murder – didn’t say a word, Singh-Bola said.
“I could see his eyes and he was staring towards me.”
Singh-Bola, a 34-year-old personal trainer, was walking to the beach after a post-Christmas function kebab when he heard “all these pops” he initially thought were firecrackers.
“And then people started running for their lives, screaming. I just ran straight towards the gunshots and I was asking people along the way if … they know whereabouts [the shooter is]. One gentleman said he was near the bridge … I was hiding down a couple of walls and behind a tree here until I saw him go down.”
Asked why he’d run towards the danger, Singh-Bola said he was “really angry”.
“It’s like somebody coming there and knocking your door down and basically firing upon your family or hurting people that you love … I just wanted to stop what was going on … I just wish we’d got there a bit earlier to be honest with you.”
He was touched by the way others had responded immediately after the incident, with people from all parts of the world – including fellow Kiwis – checking if he was okay.
“That’s what Bondi is. I don’t want people to have any hate or judgment towards each other. It’s a time now where I think we have to stand stronger than ever together, rather than be divided.”
Singh-Bola, who said he’d been having trouble sleeping since the attack and has sought counselling through his GP, doesn’t consider himself a hero, he told Morrah.
He was thinking about the Jewish community; among whom are many of his clients.
“[They’re] the most lovely people in the world and nobody deserves what happened … a lot of my friends said I was in the wrong place at the wrong time, but actually for once in my life I felt like I was in the right place at the right time.”