A 60-year-old woman who was on her way to offer puja at a temple died after she was hit by a Kolkata Municipal Corporation truck and allegedly dragged close to 100 metres on DL Khan Road on Saturday morning.
Maya Roy was declared dead by doctors after some residents of the area rushed her to SSKM Hospital.
A section of residents of the area blocked the busy DL Khan Road for some time till a team of senior police officers arrived and pacified the agitators.
“We have seized the compactor machine. But the driver managed to run away,” said a senior officer of the Hastings police station.
“We have started a case of rash and negligent driving and an attempted murder case against the driver,” he said.
A section of bystanders told the police that the truck was speeding down DL Khan Road on Saturday morning and was headed towards the race course.
Roy was hit near the intersection of DL Khan Road and Bijoy Bose Road.
Residents of the area said Roy would visit the temple every Saturday.
Roy lived on 17/9 DL Khan Road with her husband, Hemanta Kumar Roy, the police said.
“After knocking down the woman, the driver didn’t brake and kept moving. Maya-di was caught in one of the rear wheels and continued to get dragged. It was almost 100 metres,” said a resident of Vidyasagar Colony nearby.
“We kept shouting at the driver to brake and when he finally did, the woman was almost dead. By the time we took her to SSKM Hospital, she had breathed her last,” the resident said.
As the news of Roy’s death reached the colony, hundreds of residents took to the road blocking both up and down movement of traffic along DL Khan Road, which skirts past SSKM’s Trauma Care Centre towards the Presidency Correctional Home in Alipore.
A team of officers from the traffic guard and the police station initially tried talking to the agitating residents but to no avail.
Some of the residents alleged that the police would often not book speeding vehicles.
After 15 minutes, a team of senior officers reached the spot with additional forces and managed to prevail over the agitators and the blockade was withdrawn.