SHREEPUR: Shere Parki, who was planning to leave home for India on Friday, did not return from his shopping trip Wednesday evening. The 35-year-old father of two was mowed down along with five others in front of a tea shop at Lalpur in Kailali's Shreepur VDC.

Parki worked as a watchman for a company in Mumbai since his land area of two katthas did not suffice the upkeep of his family. He had twice deferred his departure to the southern country upon his wife's plea. ''Maybe he would have survived had I not stopped him from returning to India earlier,'' his wife lamented. It was heart-rending to see the couple's eight-year-old son calling out to his father at the site where the latter's body lay.

Kalawati, Raj Bahadur Aeir's daughter, could not realise that her father was lying dead in front of her. The tea-tender had been hit while serving the beverage. His seven-member family is now without a guardian and a breadwinner.

Sixty-year-old Batudevi lost her husband -- Karabire Khadka -- in the accident too. A loaded truck heading to Karnali from Godabari Flour Mill in Rajapur had hit the persons. Blocked highway resumed after the local administration agreed to provide Rs 500,000 to the kin of each dead.