Court No. - 1
Case :- FIRST APPEAL FROM ORDER No. - 1733 of 2020
Appellant :- National Insurance Co. Ltd. Respondent :- Suresh Lal Srivastava And 8 Others Counsel for Appellant :- Sudhanshu Behari Lal Gour Counsel for Respondent :- R.K. Shahi
Hon'ble Vivek Agarwal,J.
1. Heard Sri S.B.L. Gour, learned counsel for the appellant through Video Conferencing and Sri R.K. Shahi, learned counsel for the claimant present in person in the Court.
2. This appeal has been filed by the insurance company being aggrieved of the award dated 22.09.2020 passed by the learned Motor Accident Claims Tribunal, Kushinagar at Padrauna in Claim Case No. 218 of 2016, on the ground that there was change in the identity of the driver from one mentioned in the FIR inasmuch as the offending vehicle is owned by a police personnel and the originally named driver in the FIR was not having a valid driving license. Second ground which has been raised to assail the impugned award is that learned Claims Tribunal has overlooked the fact that there are two dependents of the decased Vipin Kumar Srivastava, but with a view to inflate the claim arbitrarily, father of the deceased Sri Suresh Lal Srivastava, mother of the deceased Smt. Meena Devi, adult sisters of the deceased and grand mother of the deceased have been arrayed as claimants and therefore, arbitrarily learned tribunal has deducted 1/4th of the income treating it to have been spent by the deceased on self in place of 1/3rd.
3. It is further submitted that even the company in which allegedly deceased was working was found to be closed and therefore, learned tribunal erred in computing income of the deceased at Rs. 16,000/- (sixteen thousand rupees) per month on the basis of salary certificate issued by 'Adworld Mutual Benefits Nidhi Ltd.' where deceased was allegedly working as Assistant Branch Manager (Operation/Development).
4. Sri R.K. Shahi, learned counsel for the claimants-respondents submits that except for amount which is to be deducted in the light of the law laid down in case of Smt. Sarla Verma and others vs. Delhi Transport Corporation and another as reported in (2009) 6 SCC 121, no other ground has any legal basis.
5. After hearing leraned counsel for the parties and going through the record, it is apparent that salary slip of the deceased has not been rebutted by the insurance company. Insurance company has not examined their surveyor, who had made reports about whereabouts of the employer of the deceased in the court of law and therefore, such survey stating that employer of the deceased is no more exiting will not create any doubt on the salary slip inasmuch as it is not the case of the appellant-insurance company that on the date when salary certificate was issued, company was not in operation.
6. As far as change of driver is concerned, evidence of PW1- Sruesh Lal Srivastava has been exhaustively read to point out that he was not present at the place of the accident. He had reached at the spot after one hour of the incident and had lodged FIR, as per the version of the crowd available on the spot. This witness admitted that he had mentioned name of the driver in the FIR, as per the version of the crowd, which was available at the spot, when he had reached there. Therefore, if in investigation, it is found that the driver was different then the one mentioned in the FIR, then no motives can be attached to this fact especially, when the insurance company had failed to prove its investigator's report.
7. As far as investigation report, one Ravindra Prajapati was chargesheeted in the criminal case and there is no material available on record to show that this Ravindra Prajapati was illegally or arbitrarily chargesheeted as the driver of the offending vehicle. There is no categorical findings as to false impleadment of the driver, therefore, this ground has no basis and deserves to be rejected and is rejected.
8. Thus the computation of the award amount, is required to be recalculated in the following manner namely, the tribunal has accepted income of the deceased at Rs. 16,000/- (sixteen thousand rupees) per month or Rs. 1,92,000/- (one lakh ninety two thousand rupees) per annum. When 1/3rd dependency is reduced, then the notional dependency on the family will come out to Rs. 1,28,000/- (one lakh twenty eight thousand rupees) per annum. As per the law laid down in case of National Insurance Company Limited Vs. Pranay Sethi and others as reported in (2017) 16 Supreme Court Cases 680, 40% amount is to be added towards future prospects, taking total dependency to Rs. 1,79,200/- (one lakh seventy nine thousand two hundred rupees) per annum. The age of the deceased is accepted to be between 26 to 30 years and therefore, multiplier of 17 will be applicable, taking total compensation under pecuniary head to Rs. 30,46,400/- (thirty lakhs forty six thousand four hundred rupees). Over and above this claimants are entitled to a sum of Rs. 70,000/- (seventy thousand rupees) under non-pecuniary heads in terms of the law laid down in case of Pranay Sethi (supra), taking total compensation to Rs. 31,16,400/- (thirty one lakhs sixteen thousand four hundred rupees).
9. As this court has not considered sisters of the deceased, grandmother of the deceased and father of the deceased to be dependent on the deceased, therefore, mother of the deceased Smt Meena Devi will get a sum of Rs. 6,16,400/- (six lakhs sixteen thousand four hundred rupees) along with accrued interest thereon @ 7% from the date of filing of the claim petition, which she will investing in recurring deposit account of Indian Post Office for a period of 5 years and will be free to draw interest for her own upkeep. Out of remaining sum of Rs. 25,00,000/- (twenty five lakhs rupees), 10,00,000/- (ten lakhs rupees) will be invested in a recurring deposit account of Indian Post Office for an initial period of 6 years and shall continue to be reinvested in such account till the claimant Kumari Mishri @ Archana, who is minor daughter of the deceased Vipin Kumar Srivastava, attains majority. On the date of majority, she will be free to use such amount for her own welfare. Remaining amount of Rs. 15,00,000/- (fifteen lakhs rupees) shall be payable to Smt. Priya Srivastava, widow of the deceased and this amount will be invested in recurring deposit account of Indian Post Office for a period of 6 years and Smt Priya will be free to draw interest for her own use.
10. In above terms, appeal is disposed off.
Order Date :- 6.1.2021 Vikram/-S