5-yr-old boy, his father run over by truck in Delhi

The victims were crossing a road near the Nand Nagri Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) bus depot around 5am.

A five-year-old child and his 45-year-old-father were killed after they were hit by an allegedly speeding commercial mini truck in northeast Delhi’s Nand Nagri on Saturday morning. The child’s mother and his sister had a narrow escape as some locals pulled them back as soon as they saw noticed they were in the path of the vehicle. The driver fled the spot after the accident, but was arrested from Karol Bagh later in the day.

Police said the dead persons were identified as Rajpal and his son Shiva.

Police said the dead persons were identified as Rajpal and his son Shiva.

The family was crossing a road near the Nand Nagri Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) bus depot around 5am.

The police said the driver fled the spot in his vehicle after the accident. An auto-rickshaw driver gave chase to the mini truck and managed to note its registration number, which he shared with the police. It helped the police ascertain the truck’s ownership and the person who was behind the wheel. The driver, identified as 38-year-old Shambhu Kumar, was nabbed from central Delhi’s Karol Bagh in the afternoon, the police said.

“We arrested Kumar and booked him for rash driving and causing death by negligence. We have also seized the vehicle,” said Atul Kumar Thakur, deputy commissioner of police (northeast).

Rajpal’s wife, Rajmala, and their seven-year-old daughter, Manvi, were injured. The couple and their two children had to reach Loni near Ghaziabad to meet their pregnant daughter. They had come from Uttar Pradesh’s Shahjahanpur in a bus they de-boarded at Anand Vihar interstate bus terminal around 4am.

“The family members took an auto-rickshaw and reached Nand Nagri DTC bus depot, from where they had to take a bus to Loni. They were crossing the road when the speeding mini-truck hit Rajpal and Shiva, who were walking ahead of Rajmala and Manvi,” a police officer said.

According to the officer, Rajmala in her statement told the police that the commercial vehicle would have hit her and Manvi as well had they been not pulled back by some locals. The mother-daughter duo fell onto the road, but did not sustain serious injuries.

“Rajpal and Shiva suffered serious head injuries and were rushed to a nearby government hospital, where they were declared dead on arrival. The bodies were sent to the mortuary for an autopsy,” the officer said.