A man died on the spot after he was struck down by a minibus on the Strathspey Public Road, East Coast Demerara yesterday morning.
Jagdeo Ramnarine, 36, popularly known as Narine, had just stepped out of a minibus when the vehicle, BGG 3731, collided with him, leaving him pinned to a wall.
Ramnarine, who was a Route 44 (Georgetown-Mahaica) bus driver, had left his home a few minutes before the 7am accident. The driver of the bus that hit him, Nandkumar Isardat, was his friend. Isardat, who reportedly police said was illegally overtaking when the accident occurred, is now in custody. Eight persons who were travelling in the bus were also injured in the accident.
At Ramnarine’s 78 Section ‘B,’ Non Pariel, East Cost Demerara home, his distraught wife, Bibi Shamin Rafeek, said their 11-year-old daughter received news of his death when a person called and told her “allyuh daddy dead.” The woman said her daughter immediately started hollering and her two younger brothers, aged nine years and six years, held onto her as they all broke down into tears.
Rafeek, who was appalled at the caller, immediately told her children that “the person lie…. Allyuh nah see allyuh daddy just left here?”
She said that she could not believe that her husband died on the spot. “He (Nandkumar) had to be going very fast because he paste him against the wall,” she continued. “He shoulda hit the bus. Why he hit my husband?” the woman questioned. She said Ramnarine and Isardat “usually talk together and so because both of them are bus drivers.”
Meanwhile, at the Georgetown Hospital Gopaul Isardat said his father was at in police custody at the Vigilance Police Station. The wife of the driver, Mala Devi Isardat, who was conducting, suffered injuries and she was admitted to the hospital. Two other passengers were also admitted as patients while five others were treated and sent away.
Ramnarine was described as a loving father and a helpful husband. “Every night he [does] come home and spend time with his three children…I does even bathe and go upstairs and he [does] make sure they go in they bed and so. They were very close to they father,” Rafeek said. She also noted that Ramnarine had been anticipating his daughter’s National Grade Six Assessment results and was up to the night before his death saying that he could not wait to see how well she had performed.
