United India Insurance Co Ltd v. Sabita Veshin & Ors.

1. These two appeals arise out of judgment dated 23.02.2012 passed by the Motor Accident Claims Tribunal (the Claims Tribunal) whereby compensation of ` 47,47,400/- was awarded in favour of the legal 2015:DHC:3095 representatives of deceased Ajay Veshin, who suffered fatal injuries in a motor vehicular accident which occurred on 06.04.2009.

2. During inquiry before the Claims Tribunal, it was found that the accident was caused on account of rash and negligent driving of a bus bearing registration no.DL-1PB-2137 by its driver Vikas; the Claims Tribunal accepted the salary of the deceased to be `3,87,540/- per annum, added 30% towards future prospects, deducted 1/4 towards personal and living expenses and applied a multiplier of 14 (as per the age of the deceased) to compute the loss of dependency as `47,12,400/-.

3. For the sake of convenience, the Appellant in MAC.APP.483/2012 shall be referred to as the Insurance Company and the contesting Respondents, who were the Petitioners before the Claims Tribunal shall be referred to as the Claimants.

4. The following contentions are raised on behalf of the Insurance Company:-

(i) Negligence on the part of Respondent Vikas, driver of the insured bus bearing registration no.DL-1PB-2137 was not established, still the Appellant being an insurer was made liable to pay the compensation; and

(ii) There were number of allowances granted to deceased apart from the Basic pay of `15,200/- and House Rent Allowance of `4506/-, the same ought not to have been taken into consideration to compute the loss of dependency.

5. On the other hand, the learned counsel for the Claimants while supporting the impugned judgment urges that the compensation awarded towards non-pecuniary damages, i.e. towards loss of love and affection, loss of consortium and funeral expenses was on the lower side.

NEGLIGENCE

6. In order to prove negligence on the part of the DTC bus driver, the Claimants examined Ashish Kaul PW-2 whereas the DTC examined Vikas, its driver as R3W[2]. The main thrust of the argument on behalf of the learned counsel for the Insurance Company is that initially the deceased had informed his wife that the DTC bus driver was not at fault. This question was also raised before the Claims Tribunal and was dealt with by the Claims Tribunal holding that the deceased had also stated to his wife Smt. Sabita Veshin that the driver of the DTC bus was a govt. servant and it would be a question mark on his service (if a case is registered against him). The Claims Tribunal dealt with the issue of negligence in para 12 of the impugned judgment which is extracted hereunder:-

7. The Claims Tribunal analysed the evidence of the eye witness, the averments made in the FIR, the Site Plan and found that the testimony of the eye witness is fully corroborated from the Site Plan and thus, it held that the accident was caused on account of rash and negligent driving of the bus bearing registration no.DL-1PB-2137 by its driver.

8. It may be noted that in a Claim Petition under Section 166 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988, the negligence is required to be proved only on the touchstone of preponderance of probability and not beyond the shadow of all reasonable doubt. In my view, the culpable negligence was sufficiently established. I accordingly, affirm the findings reached by the Claims Tribunal on the negligence.

QUANTUM OF COMPENSATION

9. It is well settled that all the allowances which enure for the benefit of the family of the deceased are to be taken into consideration to compute the loss of dependency. (See: National Insurance Co. Ltd. v. Indira Srivastava & Ors., 2008 (2) SCC 763).

10. The Claims Tribunal therefore, rightly included all allowances except the Performance Linked Allowance of `41,700/- per annum.