Court No. - 6
Case :- FIRST APPEAL FROM ORDER No. - 3198 of 2018 Appellant :- The Oriental Insurance Company Limited Respondent :- Santosh Ram And 4 Others Counsel for Appellant :- Vipin Chandra Dixit
Hon'ble Ashok Kumar,J.
From the perusal of the documents available on records, prima facie, it appears that accident took place at district Siwan, Bihar, whereas the claim petition has been filed by the claimants at Bareilly, U.P.
Learned counsel for the Insurance Company has submitted that in fact a preliminary objection was raised before the authorities below including the Tribunal that since the accident took place in the State of Bihar, the claim petition filed before the Tribunal at Bareilly was not maintainable.
From the perusal of the material available on record and the impugned judgment, there is no material available in this regard that the Tribunal has discussed this issue while deciding the Issue No.2 concluded that the Insurance Company failed to adduce any material even the oral evidence in this regard.
The Issue No.2 was decided without any cogent finding.
In view of the aforesaid basic facts, the matter is relegated to the Tribunal to first decide the issue as to whether the Tribunal is competent to decide the claim petition at Bareilly, UP, when admittedly, the incident took place at Siwan in the State of Bihar.
Learned counsel for the appellant submits that the Insurance Company may be allowed to adduce the material evidence before the Tribunal.
The Tribunal is, therefore, directed to grant a reasonable opportunity / time to the Insurance Company to place the relevant records before it with regard to the place of incident etc. The Tribunal is also directed to decide the claim petition afresh after deciding the issue with respect of jurisdiction first.
Learned counsel for the Insurance Company has also pointed out that in this case, both the claimants and the vehicle driver / owner are also the resident of State of Bihar. The Tribunal may proceed afresh and decide the application expeditiously.
The amount deposited by the appellant before this Court shall be refunded to the appellant within three weeks.
The Appeal is disposed of.
Order Date :- 31.7.2018 Akram