A seven-year-old boy was killed and his father is critically injured after a speeding truck hit them in south-west Kolkata’s Behala area on Friday morning.
The child, a Class 2 student, was going to school with his father when the incident took place. An irate mob in retaliation set a police van and a motorcycle on fire and ransacked several buses.
Locals said the incident took place around 7 am when the father-son duo was crossing the road. While the child died on the spot after he was run over by the truck, the father was seriously injured and rushed to the hospital.
Locals refused to hand over the body to the police alleging negligence and inaction.
A large police contingent had to be deployed and cops had to resort to lathi charge and fire tear gas shells to disperse the mob.
The truck is yet to be traced, the police said, while fire tenders have been deployed to douse the flames from the burning vehicles.