THEY had just stepped off the bus and on to the pedestrian walkway when a cyclist ran straight into them.

The impact fractured the woman's left arm, while her daughter, 10, fainted.

The incident shocked the woman's husband, MrBasker Ayengar, 45, who witnessed the accident as he was alighting from the bus.

'They dropped on the floor just like that and my son started screaming for help,' said Mr Basker, 45, a specialist associate working in the National University of Singapore.

His son, 13, was also with him as the family of four had just had supper at a neighbourhood hawker centre in Yishun at around 11pm and were on their way home.

The cyclist had fallen onto a grass patch near the bus stop along Yishun Ave 6.

Angry at the cyclist for being so reckless, Mr Basker held on to him, pinning him to the ground.

'I was so angry, I went straight for him even though he was bigger than me. I was shouting at the top of my voice,' said Mr Basker.

He described the cyclist as a 'tough-looking', dark-skinned man in his 30s.

Alleged Mr Basker: 'He did not even want to check if we were fine. He wanted to run away, but I pulled him back.

'After that, he pretended that there was something wrong with his leg, and kept saying, 'My leg, my leg'.'

However, when Mr Basker saw how badly hurt his wife and daughter were, he let the cyclist go.

He said: 'My wife was only momentarily knocked out, and told me that there was something wrong with her hand. But my daughter was still unconscious, so I had to release him to attend to my family.'

Nobody helped

Although there were three or four other pedestrians at the bus stop, none came forward to help, claimed MrBasker.

Two women who were walking ahead of them had turned around to look, but instead of helping, they walked away.

The cries of the family had caused such a commotion that some residents in the nearby block were looking down from their flats, he said. A few of the residents even shouted at the cyclist when he ran away after Mr Basker released him.

To revive his daughter, Mr Basker started slapping her face while his son called for an ambulance.

When his daughter came to, she started crying in pain, saying that her stomach hurt, said Mr Basker.

His wife, Mrs Santhi Basker , 39, was also unable to move her arm.

She claimed: 'There were no lights on the bicycle, there was no warning or no ringing of a bell either.

'I only saw something coming very fast towards me on my right, but before I could react, it had already hit us. I didn't even realise that I had fallen.

'The last thing I remember was my daughter crying out to me.'

An ambulance took his wife and daughter to Tan Tock Seng hospital. Mrs Basker's arm was put in a cast.

A doctor there had advised Mrs Basker to go for an operation for her arm.

She is still traumatised by the incident, even though it has been two weeks since it happened.

'Every time I move, I can feel a pull on my arm. It gets so bad sometimes that I feel dizzy,' she said.

She has also suffered several bruises on her legs and thigh.

Mr Basker and his family are keeping a look out for the cyclist, but have not spotted him in the area.

Said Mrs Basker: 'It's so unfair because we had the right of way as pedestrians. Cyclists should not have been cycling so quickly on the walkway.'

Police investigations are ongoing.

This article was first published in The New Paper on Nov 23, 2008.