Amit starts driving from point A and drives 13 km towards North. Then he turns…

In a direction-sense route-tracing problem, plot every straight-line leg on an X-Y grid with East as the positive x-axis and North as the positive y-axis; a “turn right” always rotates the direction of travel 90° clockwise through the cycle North → East → South → West → North. Once the final point is plotted, the shortest way back to the start is the straight-line distance between the two points, and its direction follows from the sign of the horizontal (east-west) and vertical (north-south) gap between them.

1. Take A as the origin (0, 0). Travel North 13 km, reaching (0, 13).

2. Turn right (North → East) and travel East 11 km, reaching (11, 13).

3. Turn right (East → South) and travel South 17 km, reaching (11, −4).

4. Turn right (South → West) and travel West 15 km, reaching (−4, −4).

5. Turn right (West → North) and travel North 4 km, reaching P at (−4, 0).

6. Compare P(−4, 0) with A(0, 0): both share the same north-south coordinate (0), so there is no residual north-south gap; the east-west coordinates differ by 4, with P sitting 4 km to the west of A.

As an independent check, total the north-south and east-west legs separately instead of plotting points: the north-south legs are +13 (North), −17 (South), +4 (North), which sum to 0 — confirming P is level with A. The east-west legs are +11 (East), −15 (West), which sum to −4 — confirming P is 4 km west of A. Both methods agree.

Since P is 4 km west of A with no north-south offset, the shortest way back from P to A is 4 km towards the East.