Surjit kaur and Others vs Ujaggar Singh and Another

D.V. Sehgal, J.—This appeal is directed against the award dated 15-6-1984 made by the Motor Accident Claims Tribunal, Patiala (for short "the Tribunal"), deciding a claim application filed by the appellants u/s 110-A of the Motor Vehicles Act. The appellants claimed compensation on account of the death of Mastu son of Kishna, husband of appellant No. 1, and father of appellants Nos. 2 to 8, which was caused in an accident involving bus No. PUC-3240 driven by Ujagar Singh respondent No. 1, and owned by the Pepsu Road Transport Corporation, Patiala, respondent No. 2. The grievance of the appellants is that the compensation awarded by the learned Tribunal is grossly inadequate.

On 7-9-1982 at about 6 P.M. Mastu deceased and his son Ram Singh appellant No-. 2 were coming on the road on their respective bicycles from Zirakpur. Bus No. PUC-3240 being driven by respondent No. 1 came from behind from Chandigarh side on a very rash speed. When the deceased was on the turning near village Khijargarh the bus dashed against his bicycle. He sustained injuries on his head and fell on the ground. He succumbed to the injuries on the spot. His body was carried to the Civil Hospital, Rajpura, where post-mortem examination was conducted. First information report was also lodged with the police. The deceased left behind his widow appellant No, 1, three sons appellants Nos. 2 to 4 and four daughters appellants Nos. 5 to 8, who made the claim application before the learned Tribunal alleging that the death of Mastu was caused because of rash and negligent driving of the bus by respondent No. 1. The respondents denied the allegations made in the claim application which led to the framing of the following issues by the learned Tribunal:

(1) Whether Mastu deceased died in an accident and the accident was caused due to rash and negligent driving of bus No. PUC-3240 by Ujagar Singh respondent ? OPA.

(2) Whether the claimants are legal heirs of Mastu deceased 1 OPA.

(3) To what amount, if any, are the applicants entitled by way of compensation and from whom ? OPA.

(4) Relief.

After receiving evidence both oral and documentary the learned Tribunal decided issue No. 1 in favour of the appellants holding that Mastu deceased died as a result of the accident caused by rash and negligent driving of bus No. PUC-3240 by respondent No. 1. Under issue No. 2, all of them were held to be the legal heirs of the deceased. Under issue No. 3, however, compensation to the tune of Rs. 12,000/- was awarded in favour of appellant No. 1 and Rs. 16,880/- in favour of appellants Nos. 5 to 8--the aggregate of the compensation thus being Rs. 28,880/-. It was further directed that respondents Nos. 1 and 2 shall be liable to make payment of the compensation being the driver and the owner respectively of the bus and that they should pay interest at the rate of 9% per annum on the amount of compensation if they do not make payment of the same within three months from the date of the award.

I have heard the learned Counsel for the parties. I do not find any ground to differ with the findings recorded by the learned Tribunal on issues Nos. 1 and 2.

The statements of Ram Singh, one of the appellants and Jai Ram A.W. 2, another eye-witness, clearly establish that the accident was caused because of rash and negligent driving of the bus by respondent No. 1. The evidence which has come on the record through the statements of Dr. Vinod Kumar AW 3 and Ved Parkash Photographer AW 4 further fortify the case set up by the appellants. The learned Counsel for the respondents tried to-place reliance on the statement of Ujagar Singh driver respondent No. 1 who appeared as RW 1. His statement, however, shows that he could not withstand the cross examination. His replies were evasive. His statement is only self-serving and is not worth credence. I, therefore, affirm the findings of the learned Tribunal on both these issues.

Now coming to issue No. 3, no doubt it has been found by the learned Tribunal that appellants Nos. 2 to 4 are employed and were not dependant on the deceased. It is, however, clear that all the four daughters-of the deceased, who are appellants Nos. 5 to 8, are unmarried. They were aged 21, 18, 13 and 11 years respectively at the time of the accident. Thus, Surjit Kaur appellant No. 1 widow and the four daughters were dependant on the deceased. Statement of N.S. Bhalla Junior Engineer AW 5 is to the effect that the deceased was employed under him and was drawing a salary of Rs. 572.50 per month. The learned Tribunal has held that the deceased must be spending l/3rd of his salary on himself and parting with the remaining amount for the maintenance of his four daughters and his wife. In my view, this presumption is not justified. The deceased belonged to lower strata of society. Thus, he could not be spending more than Rs. 172-50 per month on himself particularly when he had four daughters and a wife to maintain. Two of his daughters were of marriageable age. I, therefore, find it reasonable to hold that the dependency of appellants Nos. 1 and 5 to 8 on the deceased was to the tune of Rs. 400/- per month. The learned Counsel for the appellants has relied on a Division Bench judgment of this Court in Smt. Channo Devi and Ors. v. Shri Het Ram and Ors. 1983 PLR 584, to contend that since the deceased was aged 48 years at the time of the accident the multiplier of 16 should have been made applicable to work out the compensation payable to the appellants. It is clearly borne out from the evidence that the deceased was aged 48 years. In fact, no rebuttal on this point has been given on behalf of the respondents. Their learned Counsel, however, submits that the deceased was a Class IV employee of the Government and he would have retired at the age of 58 years and thus the dependency of the appellants on him could not go beyond ten years.

After considering the rival submissions of the learned Counsel, I am of the firm view that the multiplier of 16 should be applied for working out the compensation payable to the appellants. Even if the deceased had retired from service at the age of 58 he would have gainfully engaged himself in some work by which he would have easily earned about Rs. 600/- a month.

The learned Tribunal has worked out the compensation payable to appellant No. 1 applying the multiplier of 10. No sound reason for doing so has been supplied. In respect of compensation payable to appellants Nos. 5 to 8 the learned Tribunal has applied the multiplier of 5. The reason for doing so as given is that two daughters of the deceased were of marriageable age. They would have got married shortly while the other two daughters aged 13 and 11 years would have got married after 6 or 7 years. This, in my view, is not at all a sound basis for working out the amount of compensation payable to the dependant unmarried daughters of the deceased. In the Indian society for a girl of marriageable age it is difficult to find a suitable match and when the marriage is to be performed the guardians of the girl have to incur substantial expenditure no doubt according to the financial and social status of the family. I, therefore, do not agree with the learned Tribunal that the moment an unmarried girl reaches marriageable age she ceases to be dependant on her father and gets married as a matter of course. Having considered all the above aspects, I am of the considered view that for the compensation payable to appellants Nos. 1 and 5 to 8 multiplier of 16 should be applied to work out their annual dependency on the deceased. The amount of compensation thus payable would be Rs. 400 x 12 x 16=Rs. 76,800/-.

I, therefore, allow this appeal and hold that appellants Nos. 1 and 5 to 8 are entitled to payment of compensation amounting to Rs. 76,800/- for which respondents Nos. 1 and 2 are jointly and severally liable. These appellants shall also be entitled to payment of interest on the aforesaid amount of compensation at the rate of 12% per annum from the date of their claim application till the date of final payment of the amount of compensation. They shall also get the costs of this appeal which are assessed at Rs. 500/-.