Lata Mansukhani & Ors v. D.T.C.

1. Whether reporters of local papers may be allowed 10 see the judgment?

2. To be referred to the Reporter or not?

3. Whether Judgment should be reported in Digest? J [J D G M E N: REVA KHETRAPAL, J.

1. l]y way of this appeal, the appcllant-J^elhi Transport (.U)rporation seeks to assail the Judgment and award dated 30"^ May, 2003 passed by the learned Motor Accidents Claims 'I'ribunal, Delhi.

2. The facts may be brieily recapitulated as follows. On 18.07.1999, one Mohan Mansukhani, aged about 55 years, was going from his house in Model Town towards the bus stand, after crossing the G.T. Karnal Road, when he was hit by bus No.DBP-6048 on the road leading to the bus stand. Allegedly the said bus was being driven by the respondent No.5, Angrez Smgh at a very fast speed, recklessly and negligently and it hit the deceased from behind causing Mai injuries. The respondents No.l to 4, who are the legal representatives ofthe deceased, being his widow and three daughters, filed a Claim Petition under Section 166 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 seeking compensation for the untimely demise of their bread earner. The learned Motor Accidents Claims Tribunal after analyzing the evidence adduced before it held that the accident which had resulted in the unfortunate death ofthe deceased was the outcome of the rash and negligent driving ofthe offending bus by the respondent No.5. As regards the quantum of compensation, the leained liibunal, on the basis of the testimony of PW[3] Smt. Lata Mansukhani, calculated the total loss oi" dependency ofthe respondents No.l to 4 to be in the sum of ? 6,45,348/-, and alter adding the non-pecuniary I damages to the said amount awarded a sum of ^ 6,70,348/- with interest at the rate of 9% per annum from the date of the petition till reahsation. The appellant as the owner of the offending bus was directed to pay the award amount.

3. Aggrieved by the aforesaid findings ofthe Tribunal, the present appeal has been preferred by the appellant. Mr. J.N. Aggarwal, the learned counsel for the appellant, has challenged the award primarily on two grounds. The first is that the learned Tribunal ought to have held that the deceased met with his death due to his own acts of on^ission and commission, in that the deceased due to his exuberance attempted to board the bus before it had been parked at the stand for boarding by the commuters. Mr. Aggarwal contended that the negligence ofthe deceased thus contributed to his own death and to that extent the award amount deserved to be scaled down.

4. The second contention of Mr. Aggarwal, the learned counsel for the appellant, pertains to the quantum of compensation awarded by the learned Tribunal. It was contended that there was no basis for. the Tribunal to arrive at the finding that the monthly loss of dependency of the respondents No.l to 4 was ? 5,000/- per month. It was further contended that there was no evidence on record to bear out the fact that the income of the deceased would have increased over the passage of years and, as such, the learned Tribunal erred in applying the dictum laid down by the Supreme Court in the case of Sarla Dixit w. Balwant Yadav, AIR 1996 SC 1274. The counsel contended that though no specific reference had been made by the learned Tribunal to the said decision of the Supreme Court, the Tribunal had taken the average monthly income of the deceased at t 7,333/- by doubling his actual earnings of? 5,000/- to ? 10,000/- and thereafter dividing the sum total of his actual earnings and anticipated earnings by the figure of two. The counsel for the appellant also contended that the Tribunal ought to have applied the multiplier of 8 and. at best, the multiplier of 9 to the multiplicand constituting the loss of dependency of the legal representatives of the deceased. Instead, a multiplier of 11 had been applied, which could not be termed as the appropriate multiplier keeping in view the tact that the \D deceased was admittedly 55 years and 10 months of age atthe time ot the accident.

5. Mr. Navneet Goyal, the learned counsel for the respondents No.l to 4, on the other hand, sought to support the findings of the learned Tribunal with regard tothe causation ofthe accident and with regard to the rash and negligent manner in which the offending bus was being driven by the respondent No.5 resulting in the unfortunate accident. As regards the quantum of compensation awarded by the learned Tribunal, Mr. Goyal submitted that the compensation deserved to be enhanced, inter alia, on the following grounds;

(i) The learned Tribunal ought to have taken the average income of the deceased as ^ 7,500/- instead of ? 7,333/-.

(ii) Keeping in view the fact that only one daughter of the deceased was married and there were two unmarried daughters of the deceased apart from the wife of the deceased, the learned Tribunal ought to have deducted only one-fourth of the average income of the deceased towards his personal expenses and maintenance.

(iii) The learned Tribunal ought to have capitalized the loss of dependency suffered by the claimants by the multiplier of 15 keeping in view the fact that one of the daughters of the deceased is mentally challenged and her dependency is a lifelong one.

(iv) J"he learned Tribunal erred in awarding meagre amount towards the pecuniai[7] and non-pecuniary damages and no amount whatsoever has been awarded towards the loss of estate.

6. Adverting to the contention of the learned counsel for the appellant with regard to the contributory negligence of the deceased, in my view, the same is totally devoid of merit. The Tribunal has threadbare analysed the evidence of PW[2] Shri Satbir Gupta, an eye witness to the accident as well as the deposition of RWl Angrez Singh, the driver ofthe offending bus to arrive at the conclusion that the rash and negligent driving of the latter had resulted in the fatal accident.' I find no reason to differ with the conclusions of the (L Tribunal in this regard, but a look first at the testimonies of the said two witnesses.

7. PW[2] Shri Satbir Gupta, in the course of his testimony, stated that on the fateful day he was coming from L.al Bagh Ashram and going towards the bus terminal with two other persons. The deceased, Shri Mohan Mansuldiani was ahead of him and was going into the bus terminal when bus No.DBP-6048 came from behind and hit against him with the front bumper of the bus and dragged him, resulting in his collar bones being broken completely and his receiving other injuries as well. He further testified that the bus driver was driving at a fast speed. He also stated that he had narrated the incident to the police and given them all the particulars when he came to Icnow that the said Mohan Mansukhani had died. Though the witness was extensively cross-examined, he did not budge from the stand taken by him in his examination-in-chief Thus, the aforesaid testimony of PW[2] Satbir Gupta emerged unshaken after crossexamination. He clarified that the accident had taken place inside the bus terminal near the 'Juicewala shop'. In answer to a specific query • put to him, he stated that the speed ofthe bus might be 40/45 km per hour and that the front bumper left portion had hit the deceased. He categorically denied the suggestion put to him that the deceased had tried to board the moving bus and had fallen down while doing so. A lot of emphasis has been laid by the learned counsel for the appellant U on the fact that the witness in his cross-examination admitted that he knew the deceased, but this, in my view, is not a sufficient ground to discard the testimony of the witness whose statement appears to be otherwise worthy of credence and has passed the test of extensive cross-examination.

8. As against this, the statement of RWl Angrez Singh appears to me to be a self-serving one. He, in his testimony, stated that the bus was moving at a slow speed towards Azadpur Terminal for booking a scheduled trip of Route No.ll[4]. At that time, a passenger seeing the slow speed of the bus tried to board the moving bus, as a result ol which he received accidental injuries. He deposed that he had written to the i^epot Manager that the said accidenf was caused due to the rashness and negligence of the deceased, but in the coarse ol his cross-examination was compelled to admit that he had no prool oi the same. He was also forced to admit that he had not complained to any police official regarding his false implication in the criminal case. He also admitted in his cross-examination that it was only after entering the bus terminal at Azadpur that his bus was to be awarded a trip to Kutub Garh. In my view, it is difficult to fathom why a person would try to board a bus which was entering the terminal and had yet to be awarded a trip. Had the bus been leaving the terminal, it could have been argued that the person in his attempt nc^t to miss the bus had tried to board the running bus.