The image of Sadia Sukhraj – lifeless and bloodied on a hospital gurney – will forever be seared into the mind of her grandfather.
The nine-year-old had been with her father, Shailendra, on a school run on Monday when he was pulled from the car while in the driveway of a Shallcross home in Durban by three men, who then sped off with Sadia.
“The hijackers drove away with the nine-year-old child. The hijacked vehicle was pursued by the child’s father‚ and then there was a shooting‚ so we don’t know exactly how the child got shot and by whom‚” Chatsworth community policing forum chairperson Jakes Singh said.
Grandfather Prem, a 65-year-old pastor, recounting the family tragedy, said he received a chilling call from his son, also a pastor.
“He just said: ‘Dad, we have been hijacked and they took my baby away’,” he said.
He would only realise later that his granddaughter had died from a single gunshot wound in a nearby hospital, her final moments likely a flurry of panic and pain.
“I saw her there and that is an image that will never leave me … I don’t think it will,” Prem Sukhraj said, tears welling in his eyes.
Read the full story on Times Select.
'Dad, we have been hijacked and they took my baby away'
Durban family shattered after little girl killed during shootout
Image: Jackie Clausen
The image of Sadia Sukhraj – lifeless and bloodied on a hospital gurney – will forever be seared into the mind of her grandfather.
The nine-year-old had been with her father, Shailendra, on a school run on Monday when he was pulled from the car while in the driveway of a Shallcross home in Durban by three men, who then sped off with Sadia.
“The hijackers drove away with the nine-year-old child. The hijacked vehicle was pursued by the child’s father‚ and then there was a shooting‚ so we don’t know exactly how the child got shot and by whom‚” Chatsworth community policing forum chairperson Jakes Singh said.
Grandfather Prem, a 65-year-old pastor, recounting the family tragedy, said he received a chilling call from his son, also a pastor.
“He just said: ‘Dad, we have been hijacked and they took my baby away’,” he said.
He would only realise later that his granddaughter had died from a single gunshot wound in a nearby hospital, her final moments likely a flurry of panic and pain.
“I saw her there and that is an image that will never leave me … I don’t think it will,” Prem Sukhraj said, tears welling in his eyes.
Read the full story on Times Select.
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