Mumbai:
An 18-year-old television star was killed in Mumbai on Friday after the vehicle in which she was traveling in was hit by a speeding Honda City car in suburban Juhu, police said.
The car's driver, Purvesh Patkar (25), a Malad resident, was arrested and medically examined to check if he was driving under the influence of alcohol, police said.
According to the police, Neelam Bhardwaj, a Bhopal native who worked in some television serials, was on her way from her Lokhandwala residence to meet a relative in Juhu, when her auto rickshaw was rammed by a Honda City car on Friday morning.
Ms Neelam was rushed to the Cooper Hospital by some people. However, she was declared dead before admission. The same people then tried calling some numbers in her cell phone and got through to some of her friends, who reached the hospital to claim the body. As there are no eyewitnesses, we don't know how exactly the collision occurred," DN Nagar's senior police inspector V D Bhoite said.
The Honda city's driver was overpowered by a crowd and taken to the police station, where he was placed under arrest after being charged for causing death due to rash and negligent driving.
The driver of the auto rickshaw is untraceable, and the police are trying to trace him.
Ms Neelam's friends told the police that her father used to be personal assistant to a prominent politician in Madhya Pradesh, although the police are yet to verify this.