A seven-year-old boy was killed while on way to school when his pool auto overturned at Chas in Bokaro around 7am on Thursday, the driver losing control while apparently trying to save a passing goat.
Md Safan, 7, who studied in Class II of SVN Public School in Bansidih received serious head injuries and died on the spot. His classmate Md Shahdullah, also 7, and Shaheen Naz, 12, of Class VI, of the same school, received minor injuries and were released after treatment at a private hospital.
Eyewitnesses said autorickshaw driver Md Afzalhad tried to save a goat that suddenly came in front of the vehicle. Afzal was still absconding at the time this report was filed in the evening.
Police sent the body of the child for post-mortem and took a statement from bereaved father Abdul Barik, who works in a grocery shop.
A shocked Barik told this paper he did not know how to react. “We hired the autorickshaw of our locality owned by Afzal as part of an arrangement to send our children to school 4km from our house. The accident took place 1km away from the school. Like every morning, Afzal came to pick up my son from our Sultan Nagar home at 6.30am. I never dreamt I would never see him alive again,” he said. He said he got to know around 7.30am that his son was dead.
Chas OC Chunmun Singh said Barik initially said the accident took place due to the auto overturning while in the process of saving a goat but later changed his statement and blamed driver Afzal for rash driving.
“If probe proves negligence, a case of rash driving under IPC sections 279 and 333 besides 304 (A) (causing death by negligence) would be lodged against the driver,” he said.
He added the two injured children were okay and had gone home by afternoon.
School pool autos meeting with accidents is not a new phenomenon in Bokaro. On August 31, 2017, a young auto driver, Suresh Yadav, was killed while four students of Bokaro Public School, aged between 11 and 14 years, were injured on Lake Road when their auto collided with an SUV carrying DSP Poonam Minz.
