The friends of Andal Govini Rajendra Prasad, 36, say she was a kind person with a bright future who wanted to live in Sudbury permanently.
Prasad was struck and killed at the intersection of Walford Road and Ramsey View Court around 7 p.m. on Tuesday. Police are still searching for the truck involved in the hit-and-run.
“She was very kind-hearted and a very straightforward person who would say a wrong is a wrong,” said her friend, Sujay Kalakala.
Kalakala met Prasad at Laurentian University. They were in the same program in 2020 when she moved to Canada and he said she was like a sister to him.
“She was doing a research-based master's in computational sciences in the science department of Laurentian," he said.
"So she already had finished her subjects, she was having good grades and she had (ample) experience back home as she was working as a team lead at Microsoft.”
Kalakala said Prasad was going to graduate in April and had plans to make Sudbury her permanent home.
Vivek Sinha, her friend and landlord, said Prasad was on her way home from work Tuesday night when the tragedy took place.
“That particular night she was back from her job … at the New Sudbury mall and she’s usually in touch with friends of hers on the phone or just on the chat and she had a call with Sujay just before boarding the bus," Sinha said.
"Since she wasn’t carrying her ID, it took (police) a couple of hours to locate her residence, which was just 100 feet away from where the incident happened.”
Both Kalakala and Sinha said they want justice for their friend and her family. They also have many questions about what happened the night she was killed and why the driver didn't stop to help.
“Especially on Walford (Road), where you have a 40-kilometre (speed limit), you wouldn’t be expecting that kind of an accident, right, so it was shocking," Sinha said.
"If they would have helped it could have saved one life and in the process would not have created so much pain for all the family members and people around."
Kalakala said he can't understand why the driver couldn't avoid hitting her.
“Even if he was driving at a speed of even more than 100, he could have changed the direction because there was no divider or any obstruction in the middle" of the road, he said.
"He could have changed the direction. It would have been hitting another vehicle, maybe, (but) the life could have been saved."
Kalakala said Prasad had an insurance policy through the university that will cover the expenses associated with her condolence ceremony, which will be held Saturday at Jackson and Barnard Funeral home at 1 p.m.
Meantime, Sudbury police continue to search for the light-coloured Dodge Ram pickup truck believed to be involved in the case.
