Adrijaa Biswas, a student of Shri Shikshayatan School, and her father Debasish had barely moved a few hundred metres from their home in Kalikapur when a truck coming from the opposite direction nudged the rickshaw, toppling the three-wheeler and sending the two passengers tumbling to the ground

A Class X girl on her way to school in a rickshaw with her father on Friday morning was crushed under the wheels of a cement-laden truck off the EM Bypass.

Around 7.15am, Adrijaa Biswas and her father Debasish had barely moved a few hundred metres from their home in Kalikapur when a truck coming from the opposite direction nudged the rickshaw, toppling the three-wheeler and sending the two passengers tumbling to the ground.

By the time Biswas got up, he saw his daughter trapped under the wheels of the truck.

“I don’t have a recollection of how I fell, but when I got up I saw my daughter’s head under the rear wheels of the truck. I cried out to the driver but he had fled by then and we had to push the lorry to get her out,” said Biswas, chief manager at the State Bank of India’s New Alipore branch.

The student of Shri Shikshayatan School was rushed to Medica Superspecialty Hospital nearby where she was declared brought dead.

Adrijaa fell to her death off the Bypass where a number of new complexes are coming up because of which trucks loaded with construction materials keep moving dangerously up and down the narrow lanes and bylanes.

She would always go to school by car but they were headed towards the Bypass to hail a taxi on Friday as the driver, down with fever, had not turned up. “We had taken a rickshaw to help us get to a taxi,” Biswas said.

The accident spot in Kalikapur and (above) the victim. Pictures by Pradip Sanyal

The accident occurred in the Geetanjali Park area of Kalikapur. “After the truck hit the rickshaw, the girl fell on the road and landed under the rear wheels of the lorry,” said an officer of Garfa police station. “The lanes are any way very narrow and vehicular movement is further restricted due to the passage of trucks and lorries. This lorry too was carrying cement,” he added, citing that their movement within city limits is allowed till 8am.

Adrijaa’s pre-selection exams were on and life science was scheduled for Friday. “She was an above-average student and an obedient girl who would be regular in school. What happened is very unfortunate and our condolences are with the family,” said Indrani Ganguly, principal of Shri Shikshayatan.

Adrijaa used to learn dance at Dakshinee and according to her mother Mohua “she was very passionate about dancing”.

Ganguly and some teachers from the school visited the parents on Friday afternoon.

“She was brought to the hospital around 8am but she was already dead. She had incurred injuries on the left side of her face, neck and left side of the chest,” said a doctor in the emergency ward of Medica Superspecialty Hospital.

A case has been started against the driver, who is yet to be arrested. The truck has been impounded.