Speeding school bus crushes couple on cycle to death in Gurugram

The bus driver, who fled the spot after the accident, was arrested later in the day.

A couple cycling to work was crushed to death allegedly by a private school bus at Sector 44 on Thursday morning. The driver fled the spot after the accident, leaving the bus behind. However, he was arrested later in the day, police said.

After the accident, the villagers from Kanhai and Wazirabad gathered at the spot and vandalised the bus and pelted it with stones in protest. (Parveen Kumar / HT Photo)

There were no children on board as the bus was on its way to pick them for school, police said. Soon after the incident, locals vandalised the bus leading to a brief traffic hold-up.

The accident happened around 7.20am when Giyasuddin Sarkar (58) and his wife Anju Yara Biwi (47) were on their way from Wazirabad village to KR Mangalam World School in South City-1, where they worked as helpers. According to eyewitnesses, the couple came under the front wheel of the bus, which was taking a left turn from a CNG station after gas filling.

A commuter informed the police control room. Eyewitnesses told the police that the bus was allegedly being driven at high speed. Police said Giyasuddin died on the spot from head injuries and his wife passed away while she was being taken to a private hospital, about 200 metres away from the accident spot. A case was registered under sections 279 (rash driving) and 304-A (causing death by negligence) of the Indian Penal Code at Sushant Lok police station.

Police arrested 30-year-old Kuldeep Narayan, a resident of Sonipat. “The driver had been associated with DPS, Sector 45, for the last six months. He surrendered at Sushant Lok police station in the afternoon. The officials of the school management had come along with the accused driver and they said there was no conductor in the bus when the incident took place,” said Anil Kumar, assistant commissioner of police(ACP), DLF.

Despite repeated attempts, the school principal did not respond to calls and messages seeking a response.

After the accident, the villagers from Kanhai and Wazirabad gathered at the spot and vandalised the bus and pelted it with stones in protest. The family members of the couple also blocked roads in the area. “The villagers broke all the window panes of the school bus and even tried to set it ablaze. They blocked the road for ten minutes before a police team from Sushant Lok reached the spot and a got a measure of control over the situation,” Kumar said.

Police have also registered a case under sections 341(wrongful restraint), 427 (causing damage), 147(Rioting) and 149 (being a member of an unlawful assembly) of the Indian Penal Code against the people, who blocked the road and vandalised the school bus.

Farrukh Hussain, son of the deceased, said his parents left home around 6.45am and someone from the spot visited their house around 7.40am. “We rushed to the spot and found my father lying in a pool of blood below the bus. The eyewitnesses told us that my mother was breathing when people took her to the hospital. We have demanded action against the school management and the driver. No one from the school’s management even visited us to pay condolence,” Hussain said.

Hussain said his parents had been working in the same school for last the 10 years. They had moved to Wazirabad village from Harirampur block of Dakshin (South) Dinajpur district in West Bengal.

The bodies were laid to rest on Thursday evening at Ghata village graveyard.

The couple is survived by three sons and one daughter who is married and stays in their neighbourhood in Wazirabad village.