Neighbours and relatives mourn before the cremation. Picture by Amit Datta

When six-year-old Meeli Chen returned home from hospital on Monday morning, she kept asking one question: “Where is Ma?”

Little did she know that her relatives were preparing to cremate her mother, Rita Chen, by the evening.

Meeli’s mother Rita and four members of the Lee family died in a collision on Saturday morning when their car collided with a milk van. Meeli was the sole survivor.

She was rushed to a local hospital and later shifted to a Calcutta clinic, from where she was discharged on Monday morning. “She has been very quiet since she returned home. She started looking for her mother as soon as she entered the house. When she could not locate her, she started asking us where she was,” said cousin Thien Coo Lee.

Coo lost his mother, Yueh Hou Lee, sister-in-law Dalamu Lee, nephew Chen Hsing Lee and niece Xiu Jin Lee in the accident. The family was on its way to Mayapur, when the car collided with the milk van on National Highway 34 in Nadia’s Ranaghat. They were headed for the Radha-Krishna temple in Mayapur to celebrate Doljatra.

Police officers in Nadia said fog-induced low visibility caused of the accident.

The Lee and the Chen families have been living in Calcutta for three generations. They left the city for Mayapur on Friday evening. They stayed over at a friend’s hotel in Kalyani on Friday night.

On Monday evening, more than 500 members of the Chinese community turned up at the Lee residence to pay homage to the departed. They visited a Chinese temple off Poddar Court to offer prayers before the cremation.