Girl run over by city school bus that hit her erick | page 27A 12-year-old girl died under the wheels of a school bus after it rammed the e-rickshaw carrying her and threw her onto the road near Majlis Park Metro station in northwest Delhi on Tuesday morning. The bus driver has been arrested. Four other children, including her elder sister and cousin, in the rickshaw, which was their daily mode of school transport, were unharmed.12-Year-Old Dies After Bus Hits E-Rickshaw, Then Runs Over Her | page 4New Delhi: A 12-year-old girl lost her life after being run over by a school bus near Majlis Park metro station in northwest Delhi Tuesday morning. The bus first hit an e-rickshaw Priyanshi was taking to school. The impact hurled her onto the road, and she was run over by the same bus.The Class VI student of a govt school in Model Town and a resident of Mukundpur was taken to Babu Jagjivan Ram Memorial Hospital, where doctors declared her dead. Her elder sister, Sejal (16), a cousin and two more students were in the e-rickshaw. No other injuries were reported.Police apprehended Kamal Singh (55), the bus driver, from the spot and seized the vehicle, which prima facie, was being illegally operated as a school bus.The bereaved family claimed that precious minutes were lost following the accident. According to Priyanshi’s uncle, Roshan Kumar, while Sejal and the cousin screamed for help as she lay critically injured on the road, most of the bystanders chose to shoot videos of the accident site instead of rushing her to hospital when every second mattered. “Doctors told us if she had reached 15 minutes earlier, she could have been saved. However, it took nearly half an hour to take her to the hospital,” Kumar said.The e-rickshaw, which was carrying five children, was heading to Model Town. The bus, which was also carrying school students, was going from Majlis Park towards Pitampura, police said, adding the Adarsh Nagar police station was alerted about the accident around 7 am.Some labourers working at a nearby construction site recalled the chaos that followed the accident that took place on the busy road.“We rushed to the spot and found a huge crowd had gathered. An ambulance was called. The girl was lying on the road, while another girl had bloodstains splattered on her uniform,” said Manish (18), a labourer.Another labourer, Bharat (18), claimed accidents were very common on the stretch. “The road remains busy throughout the day. This accident led to traffic snarls that lasted for hours,” he added.Priyanshi would travel to school in the same e-rickshaw every day, police said, adding that her family knew its driver, Ajay Prasad (45), well. He is being questioned and the e-rickshaw has been seized.Police personnel and a Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL) team inspected the site. Priyanshi’s body has been preserved at the hospital’s mortuary for a postmortem examination.The accident has raised concerns about the safety of school children during their commute in the city. Police are looking into whether the school bus was following the permit rules specified by Delhi govt. According to the rules, such a vehicle should be painted yellow and ‘school bus’ must be written on the back and front. In case of a hired bus, ‘on school duty’ should be clearly mentioned.At the Adarsh Nagar police station, TOI found the seized white bus did not follow any of these rules.A Final FarewellPriyanshi is survived by sister Sejal, father, Pramod Kumar – a guard at a mall – and her mother, a homemaker. The girl bid goodbye to her family with her customary “Radhe Radhe” as she left for school in the morning. Little did her family realise that was the last time they would see her alive.The bubbly preteen recently enrolled in a new school after completing her primary education. Throughout the summer vacation, the Class VI student spoke excitedly about the new session, eager to return to the classroom.“She loved mathematics and dreamt of building a career around it. She always scored good marks,” her uncle, Roshan Kumar, told TOI outside the mortuary.Having recently shifted from a private school, Priyanshi quickly settled into a govt secondary school in Model Town. Her relatives recalled how she would eagerly ask them when the classes would resume after the summer recess.“On Monday night, she diligently finished her homework and prepared charts and project files that she was looking forward to submitting the next morning. Both she and my daughter were working on the charts together. They looked so excit-ed while doing the assignment,” Kumar said.The family – three brothers, their wives and four children – lives in the same locality in Mukundpur. Kumar said either he or his elder sister-in-law would normally accompany the kids to school. “We didn’t go with them today. That thought will always haunt us,” he said, adding that the cousins often travelled together. However, since Priyanshi’s e-rickshaw was full Tuesday, Kumar’s daughter took another one.The charts that Priyanshi carefully prepared and her packed school bag are now among the memories her relatives are desperately clutching onto as they struggle to come to terms with the monumental loss. “We never imagined that Tuesday morning would be the last time we would hear her say ‘Radhe Radhe’,” her uncle lamented.