Techie dies in Mumbai hit-and-run horror. Her brother’s open letter on Facebook goes viral

A 22-year-old engineer with TCS,  Archana Pandya was killed in a horrifying hit-and-run accident involving an unknown car on Wednesday (May 13). However, what’s more shocking is that the girl was left lying injured in front of the Vanrai police station, Goregaon (East) for close to 20 minutes without the cops taking any kind of notice. According to news reports, the police are still clueless about either the vehicle or the driver.

In an open letter posted on Logical Indian’s Facebook page, Archana’s brother,  Siddharth Pandya, lashes out at the pedestrians, who did not attend to her immediately. In his post, he also has a message for media houses of the country.

Here’s Siddharth’s post

* My ‘Nirbhaya’ is gone *

13 May 2015, Wednesday. It started as normal day but it ended leaving behind a lot of pain and questions as I had to let go of ‘half of my life’ – my dearest, cutest, lovely, innocent sister Archana Kirit Pandya (age 22). Please note, she was hale and hearty till 9:00 PM on 13 May 2015 until I got a call from someone asking ‘Do you know Archana Pandya?’ Yes I replied, I am his brother’. The person told to me to come to Trauma Care, near JVLR urgently as my sister had met with an accident and seemed to be critical. I left from my workplace with a colleague; the only thing echoing in my ears from then on has been what my dad said ‘ben nathi’ (your sister has died) and mom said ‘mane mari deeri joiye che’ (I want my daughter back).

My purpose of writing this post is not to get condolences or sympathy of anyone but to ask some questions about the so called ‘accident’. She was hit by a high speed vehicle during peak hours in Mumbai near one of the busiest streets, the ‘Western Express Highway’, and only thing the driver could do was pick her up and keep her on the pedestal adjoining the service road opposite the hub mall when her head was bleeding badly. Had he shown some empathy and rushed her to a nearby hospital which was only 2 minutes away from the accident site or atleast given her first aid, she would be alive!

After she was kept on the pedestal by the driver, for about 20-25 minutes there were people who came and saw her but did not help her until police came from a nearby station and took her to the hospital. Could they have shown some sympathy and rushed her to a nearby hospital which was only 2 minutes away from the accident site?

The answer is yes, that’s what hurts me. The common people make noise about corruption, bad justice system, traffic management, etc but they forget they are equally responsible for this shit as the only contribution from them is only ‘talk’ and ‘no act’. The driver was responsible for the accident but the onlookers could have saved a life, and trust me it was a precious life, at least to me and my parents. The best part is that nobody knows what happened – the rickshawallas, the hawkers, the onlookers, nobody, which is unbelievable! People will argue that Mumbai police will find the hit-and-run driver and get him punished but I lost my sister and I will never see her again.

For media houses, I would like to say that I know my sister dying in a hit-and-run is not a so called ‘Breaking News’ story because the person ‘accused’ to be behind the wheels is not Superstar Salman khan (I can say that with certainty as he is in Kashmir) nor is the person dying some VVIP but many journos like Arnab Goswami, Bharka Dutt and many others keep harping on their shows daily that the media is, for and by the people. So I would make a humble request to you guys to help me find answers to these questions.

Before I close my comments, I would like readers to note that I am not trying to draw references to Delhi – Nirbhaya case as I am completely aware that the facts of both are very different. But some things about Archana I would like to share with people reading my post. Archana was 22 and she got a job with a big MNC – TCS a month back and after her training she commenced her job on 8 May 2015. She was so excited about her job that the only things she used to discuss with us would be work, work environment, her colleagues and how much she was liking her job.

She was very proud of herself now that she had a job all by herself. She used to discuss in detail how could she become a good professional. My parents and I had never seen her so happy in life and she had made plans to save whatever she earned and take mom to Leh – Ladakh next year. That’s Is why she is ‘my Nirbhaya’ as the best phase of her life had just started and she wanted to live her life to the fullest. But it was cut short to just 5 days and at the pedestal where she was fighting her death like a real braveheart for 20 long minutes in search of a helping hand from the so called common people which never came initially and once it came it was too late.