A Burrabazar trader was mowed down by a truck just as he stepped out of Bhootnath temple in Nimtala on Sunday morning.

Police said Binod Kumar Singhania, 40, was crossing Nimtala Ghat Street around 5.30am when the speeding truck hit him.

Devotees who had gathered in the temple took the textile trader to RG Kar Medical College and Hospital, where doctors declared him dead.

The vehicle was impounded but the driver fled.

Binod, a bachelor, visited the temple every morning. At times he would spend the night in his business outlet and return home in the morning after offering puja at the temple.

“He did not return home last night. He told us that he would come in the morning after offering puja and spend the day with us,” Binod’s 62-year-old father Debendra Singhania.

He came to know about his son’s death around 7.30am, when an officer from Jorabagan police station called up his Lake Town house.

In another incident, T.K. Mukherjee, a sergeant of the wireless department, and his son Joy were seriously injured when an unidentified private vehicle knocked them down on Strand Road around 1pm on Sunday. Police said the mishap occurred when the father-son duo were crossing the road in front of Scoop, in Babughat.

The driver sped away with his vehicle.

The two were admitted to CMRI, where Joy’s condition was stated to be critical. “We suspect there is a haemorrhage in Joy’s brain. He is unconscious most of the time. Mukherjee had fractured his arms,” said a doctor of the hospital.

Police said the two went to a Strand Road institution, where Joy, 17, sat for an admission test for an engineering course. “They were walking down the stretch after the exam when the car hit them,” said an officer.