Court No. - 27
Case :- FIRST APPEAL FROM ORDER No. - 2531 of 2008 Appellant :- Executive Engineer E.D.D. Amroha And Another Respondent :- Urmila And Others Counsel for Appellant :- Rajendra Kumar Mishra Counsel for Respondent :- Mohammad Wasim,Arvind Kumar Pandey,Ram Shiromani Yadav
Hon'ble Saral Srivastava,J.
Heard Sri Rajendra Kumar Mishra, learned counsel for the appellants and Sri Mohammad Wasim, and Sri Ram Shiromani Yadav, learned counsel for the respondents.
By means of the present appeal, the appellants have challenged the order dated 31.3.2008 passed by the Commissioner Workman Compensation Act, 1923/ Assistant Labour Commissioner, Moradabad in Workman Compensation Case No. 44 of 2005, whereby the Commissioner has awarded Rs. 4,67,250/- as compensation to the claimants-respondents.
The brief fact of the case are that one Preetam Singh, was stated to be employee of the appellants-corporation and in the intervening night of 30/31.12.2014 at about 2:00 P.M. on the instructions of the appellants after taking shut down from Guldia Feeder, he was repairing electricity on the electricity pole situated on turning of Kalyanpur Sodbijnor road. It was stated that despite there was shut down, Rampal Tyagi S.S.O. and JEE R.P. Bansal negligently switched on the electricity due to which the current had flown in the wire which caused injuries to Preetam Singh which caused his death. It was further stated that Preetam Singh was getting a salary of Rs.4,000/- per month. In the aforesaid backdrop, the claimants-respondents prayed for a compensation for the death of Preetam Singh.
The appellants-corporation has contested the claim petition by filing written statement contending therein that Preetam Singh was not their employee. It was further contended that on the date of alleged accident there were four lineman 'Mate' posted on Guldia Feeder and as such there was no occasion to take work from daily wager or casual employee. Thus, Preetam Singh was not official duty and the repairing work alleged to have been carried out on the electricity pole by Preetam Singh was on the basis of private complaint with which the appellant has no concern.
On the basis of pleadings between the parties, the Commissioner has framed four issues.
On the issue no. 1 and 2 with respect of employment of deceased and whether the death of Preetam Singh arose on account of injuries suffered by him during the course of employment, the Commissioner returned a finding on the basis of evidence on record that deceased was employee of the appellant and while doing the repairing work on the electricity pole, he had suffered injuries which caused his death.
In recording the aforesaid finding, the Commissioner has considered the documentary evidence namely duty pass of Preetam Singh with respect to Loksabha General Election, 1999 from which it is evident that Preetam Singh working as Mate, visiting pass issued by Z. Khan S.D.O. in favour of Preetam Singh, list of persons working as Mates who has completed 240 days in a year in which the name of deceased Preetam Singh was shown at serial no. 56. The Commissioner further noticed the fact that these documentary evidence have not been rebutted by the appellants and on the basis of those documentary evidence on record, the Commissioner held that the deceased was the employee of the appellants-corporation. Further, the Commissioner found that as per postmortem report, the cause of death was electricity current, therefore, he returned a finding that on account of employment of injury Preetam Singh had died.
Challenging the aforesaid finding, learned counsel for the appellants has submitted that it was a specific plea of appellants that the deceased was not employee of the appellants- corporation. He submits that in this regard the appellant has filed affidavit of officer concerned Z. Khan, S.D.O., who have stated in the affidavit that the deceased was not employee of the appellants-corporation and further, he had not issued any instructions to the deceased for repairing. He further contends that since there was no complaint in the department regarding electric fault by any consumer on the fateful day, therefore, there was no occasion for any repairing work to be carried out on the electric pole.
Per contra, learned counsel for the respondents submits that the employment of deceased was proved by filing documentary evidence namely, Loksabha General Election duty pass 1999, visiting pass issued by Z. Khan S.D.O., list of persons working as Mates who has completed 240 days in a year in which the name of deceased Preetam Singh was shown at serial no. 56. and these documents were not denied by the appellant. Thus, the finding of the Commissioner in respect of employment of deceased is based on proper appreciation of evidence on record.
He further contends that Z. Khan S.D.O. has filed his affidavit, but even in the said affidavit, he has not stated that he has not issued any such visiting pass, i.e., paper no. 7 to the deceased.
He submits that the deceased was doing the repairing work on electricity pole on the instructions of the appellants and while doing so, on account of the electricity current which ran into the line due to the negligence of the officers of the appellant, Preetma Singh suffered injuries and died.
I have heard the rival submissions of the parties and perused the record.
As noticed the above, the Commissioner in recording a finding in respect of employment of deceased has relied upon the documentary evidence namely Loksabha General Election Duty Pass 1999, visiting pass issued by Z. Khan, S.D.O. and list of persons working as Mates who has completed 240 days in a year in which the name of deceased Preetam Singh was shown at serial no. 56. These documents were not disputed by the appellants. It is further relevant to notice that Z. Khan, S.D.O. has filed his affidavit and in that affidavit he has not denied the fact of issuing the visiting pass in favour of Preetam Singh.
In view of the aforesaid, the finding of the Commissioner with respect to the employment of deceased with the appellants- corporation is based on proper appreciation of evidence and material on record and is not perverse.
Further, it is also admitted on record that while doing the repairing work on electricity pole, Preetam Singh had suffered injuries which caused his death. There is no evidence on record to establish that Preetam Singh had died while doing the repairing work on the complaint of some private persons. Thus, the injuries suffered by the Preetam Singh causing his death arose during the course of employment.
As there is no substantial question of law which is to be answered by this Court, the appeal lacks merit and is, accordingly, dismissed. There shall be no order as to costs.
Order on Cross-Appeal No. 9 of 2018.
Sri Mohammad Wasim, and Sri Ram Shiromani Yadav, learned counsel for the cross-objector states that cross-objector/ claimants do not want to press the cross-objection.
Consequently, the cross-objection is dismissed.
Order Date :- 26.2.2019 Ishan