Students of Tri-Chandra College took to the streets on Wednesday demanding justice for Sabin Phuyal, a 21-year-old B.Sc third year student at the college who was killed in a road accident at Tarakeshwar Municipality-3 in Kathmandu on Sunday.

A tipper truck with the number plate Ba5Kha 6775 had hit Phuyal while he was on his way home at around 9pm. Phuyal was a resident of Panchmane.

The driver of the truck and his assistant have been on the run since.

Students of the college have been demanding the duo be arrested and justice ensured for the victim. At the protest, students sloganeered against Nepal Police and demanded the security put a stop to ‘tipper terrorism.’

Phuyal’s friends claim the accused not only hit Phuyal with the tipper but also gashed him with a shovel afterwards to ensure his death.

Suman Timalsena, one of Phuyal’s classmates who was a part of Wednesday's protest at the Tri Chandra College area, blamed the police for not expediting the process to detain the culprits and bring them to book.

“Phuyal and I had left college around the same time on different bikes but I was ahead of him,” said Timalsena, who lives at Chisapani in Tarakeshwar, nearby Phuyal’s residence. “I started asking around since he was late returning home.”

Later, when Timalsena went back to search for Phuyal, he heard the siren calls of a police van. “That was when I saw his body. He had been dragged around 20 metres from the accident site and his bike was kept on a double stand,” Timalsena said. “It all looked very suspicious to me.”

The students of the college have announced indefinite protests until the police investigate the case and provide justice to the family of the deceased.

“It’s a murder,” said Gobinda Koirala, a leader of the Nepal Student Union who was leading Wednesday’s protest. “Those involved in the crime should be sentenced to life imprisonment.”

Parshuram Aryal, chair of Tarakeshwar Municipality’s ward 3, also demanded immediate police investigation into the case, calling it a ‘very serious crime’. Aryal termed Phuyal’s death a loss to the community in Tarakeshwar.

“Phuyal was a very talented student. It [his death] is a great loss to our village and community,” Aryal said.

According to Aryal, Bimal Balami, owner of the tipper truck, and his brother Rahul Balami bribed a ‘fake’ truck driver and presented him to the police. “They had presented one Shivaji BK as the driver of the tipper. He was given Rs 350,000 by the owner to pose as the tipper driver,” Aryal said. “The real driver of the tipper, Shankar Balami, 24, and his assistant, Sujan Balami, 19, aka Dalle, are on the run.”

Following the incident, locals of Tinpiple area have been protesting for the past three days, obstructing vehicular movement in the area. Police have arrested 10 youths including Prakash Phuyal, the brother of the deceased.

Phuyal’s body is currently kept at Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital, Maharajgunj for postmortem.

Metropolitan Police Circle Balaju is investigating the case. The Post’s repeated attempts to contact Deputy Superintendent Rabin Bista, head of Metropolitan Police Circle, were unsuccessful.

Meanwhile, Superintendent of Police Dinesh Raj Mainali, chief of District Police Range Kathmandu, said the police are closely looking into the case.

“The police are ready to investigate the issue, but the family of the deceased did not file an FIR [first information report] immediately after the incident,” Mainali said. “The locals in the area have been involved in vandalism instead of cooperating with police for further investigation. We are very serious about the case.”

Ward chair Aryal had reached the Metropolitan Police Circle Balaju to file an FIR on Wednesday afternoon.

Security officials who have handled traffic-related cases in the past said that some drivers even resort to killing the injured as they have to bear the cost of the victim’s treatment over their lifetime, while the culprit can go scot-free after paying a certain amount of money for once if the victim is dead.

“In the case of death in such incidents, the drivers can get scot-free by paying Rs500,000 but they have to bear the cost of medical treatment for the entirety of the victim’s life if the injury isn’t cured immediately,” said Sanjib Sharma Das, a former spokesperson at the Metropolitan Traffic Police Division.