1. Smt. Ishwari W/o Late Dileshwar Kumar Aged About 25 Years 2. Minor Nayan v. 1. Girdhari Lal R/o Ms Payal Travels G.E. Road Durg, Tehsil And District Du
Case Details
1 / 6 2025:CGHC:37474 NAFR HIGH COURT OF CHHATTISGARH AT BILASPUR MAC No. 175 of 2024 1. Smt. Ishwari W/o Late Dileshwar Kumar Aged About 25 Years 2. Minor Nayan D/o Late Dileshwar Kumar Kumar, Aged About 1 Month 3. Smt. Dayabati W/o Nilkanth Aged About 45 Years 4. Nilkanth S/o Luduram Aged About 48 Years 5. Domeshwar S/o Nilkanth Aged About 18 Years 6. Kumari Ishwari D/o Nilkanth Aged About 22 Years All are R/o Village Salhaitola, Tehsil Daundi, District Balod, Chhattisgarh. --- Appellants/ Applicants-Claimants versus 1. Girdhari Lal R/o Ms Payal Travels G.E. Road Durg, Tehsil And District Durg, C.G. (Driver of Offending Vehicle) 2. Ms Payal Travels G.E. Road Durg, Tehsil And District Durg, C.G. (Owner of Offending Vehicle) 3. The Oriental Insurance Company Limited Circular Manager, Circular Office, Near Rajendra Garden, Parmanand Building, Durg, District Durg, C.G. (Insurer of Offending Vehicle)
Legal Reasoning
____________________________________________________________ For Appellants : Mr. Vidhya Bhushan Soni, Advocate ---Respondents/ Non-applicants PAWAN KUMAR JHA Digitally signed by PAWAN KUMAR JHA For Respondents No. 1 & 2 : Mr. Vinod Sharma, Advocate For Respondent No. 3 : Mr. T.K. Tiwari, Advocate Hon'ble Shri Justice Parth Prateem Sahu Judgment On Board 31/07/2025 1. Heard on I.A. No. 01, application for condonation of delay of 12 days in filing of appeal. 2 / 6 2. On due consideration of the submission made by learned counsel for the respective parties, I.A. No. 01 is allowed and the delay of 12 days in filing appeal is hereby condoned. 3. Learned counsel for appellants submits that the liability to satisfy the amount of compensation is upon Respondent No. 3-Insurance Company which is represented by the counsel and therefore the case be heard finally at motion stage. 4. The said submission of learned counsel for appellants of liability to satisfy the amount of compensation upon non-applicant No. 3-insurance company is not disputed by the counsel for Respondent no. 3. 5. With the consent of the parties, case is heard finally. 6. Appellants-claimants have filed this appeal under Section 173 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 (for short “Act of 1988”), challenging the award dated 03.10.2023 passed by Learned First Additional Motor Accident Claims Tribunal, Balod, District Balod, Chhattisgarh (for short “Claims Tribunal”) in Claim Case No. 102/2022, whereby learned Claims Tribunal allowed the application filed under Section 166 of the Act, 1988 in part, awarded total sum of ₹ 22,92,000/- as compensation in motor accidental death case, fastened first liability to satisfy amount of compensation upon non-applicant No. 3-insurance company. 7. Motor accident occurred on 25.08.2022 at about 02:00 pm, near village Dallirajhara by a truck bearing number CG07BF8569 (hereinafter referred to as “offending truck”) by its driver non-applicant No. 1 while driving it rashly and negligently and death of Dileshwar Kumar (deceased) is not in dispute. Appellants-claimants have filed this appeal seeking enhancement of amount of compensation awarded by the Claims Tribunal. 8. For the foregoing discussion, this Court is not dealing with the facts of accident as pleaded by the parties in their claim application, reply to the 3 / 6 claim application and further adverted in the impugned award but only considering the submissions made by learned counsel for respective parties on enhancement of compensation. 9. Learned counsel for appellants-claimants would submit that the Claims Tribunal has assessed the income of deceased as ₹ 10,000 per month only and has not added income towards daily allowances which was being paid by the employer, which was also admitted by employer in his evidence before the Claims Tribunal. He next contended that the Claims Tribunal has awarded only ₹ 1,20,000 towards loss of consortium which would be only for three claimants whereas number of claimants are six. 10. Learned counsel for Respondent No. 3 opposes the submission of learned counsel for appellants and would submit that Claims Tribunal has rightly assessed the income of deceased, established as ₹ 10,000 per month and further that the claimant no. 5 & 6 being siblings of deceased are not entitled for compensation under the head of loss of consortium and relied upon the decision of Hon’ble Supreme Court in the case of Magma General Insurance Company vs. Nanu Ram alias Chuhuru Ram and others reported in (2018) 18 SCC 130. 11. Learned counsel for Respondents No. 1 and 2 while adopting the submission made by learned counsel for Respondent No.3 submitted that the amount of compensation computed and awarded by the Claims Tribunal is just and proper, hence, it does not call for any interference. 12. I have heard learned counsel for the parties and also perused the record of claim case. 13. Sofar as the submission made by learned counsel for appellants-claimants with regard to assessment of income of deceased on the date of accident is concerned, to prove income of deceased, claimants have examined Rohit 4 / 6 Jaiswal, employer and owner of offending truck, as AW-2. In his evidence, he stated that he engaged deceased as driver and paying ₹ 10,000 per month as salary and also paying an amount towards daily allowance for his meals and food etc. As the amount being paid to deceased driver has been satisfied but the fact remains that as the deceased was being paid ₹ 1,000 per trip, how much amount can be ascertained for his daily allowance on the date of accident occurred on 25.08.2022, therefore, I find it appropriate to assess daily allowance of ₹ 200 per day ie., ₹ 6,000 per month. By adding the said amount to the monthly income of ₹ 10,000, the final assessed amount of deceased on the date of accident would be ₹ 16,000 per month. It is ordered accordingly. 14. So far as the second submission made by learned counsel for appellants- claimants with regard to non-award of amount of compensation towards loss of consortium to all the claimants is concerned, Hon’ble Supreme Court in the case of Nanu Ram alias Chuhuru Ram (supra) has explained three types of consortium to be paid to claimants ie., loss of spousal consortium to widow/ husband, loss of parental consortium to children and loss of filial consortium to parents of the deceased. In the case at hand, claimant no. 1 is widow, claimant No. 2 is minor child, claimants no. 3 & 4 are parents and claimants no. 5 & 6 are brother and sister of deceased. Therefore, in the opinion of this Court, learned Claims Tribunal has not committed any error in awarding compensation of ₹ 40,000 each under the head of loss of consortium to claimants No. 1, 3 & 4, however, failed to award compensation to claimant no. 2, minor child of deceased, under loss of parental consortium. Therefore, I find it appropriate to award ₹ 40,000 to claimant No. 2 under the head of loss of parental consortium. It is ordered accordingly. 5 / 6 15. Hon’ble Supreme Court in the case of National Insurance Company Limited vs. Pranay Sethi & ors, reported in (2017) 16 SCC 680 has observed that compensation under the head of other conventional heads is to be increased by 10% in every three years and therefore amount of compensation under the heads of funeral expenses would be ₹ 16,500 from ₹ 15,000, loss of estate would be ₹ 16,500 from ₹ 15,000, and loss of consortium would be ₹ 44,000 each from ₹ 40,000. 16. For the foregoing discussion, the amount of compensation to be awarded to appellants-claimants requires re-computation, which is as under. Compensation ₹ 34,27,200/- Particulars • Annual Loss of income/ dependency = ₹ 1,92,000/- (₹ 16000x12) • Addition towards loss of future prospects @ 40% (₹ 1,92,000 + 40% of ₹ 1,92,000 = ₹ 2,68,800) • Deduction of 1/4 towards personal and living expenses (₹ 2,68,800 x 1/4= ₹ 67,200); ₹ 2,68,800 - ₹ 67,200 = ₹ 2,01,600/- • Multiplier of 17 ₹ 2,01,600 x 17 = ₹ 34,27,200/- Loss of Spousal Consortium, Loss of Parental ₹ 1,76,000/- Consortium and Loss of Filial Consortium to Appellants No. 1 to 4 (₹ 44,000 x 4) Loss of estate Funeral Expenses Total ₹ 16,500/- ₹ 16,500/- ₹ 36,36,200/- 17. Now the appellants/claimants shall be entitled for total sum of compensation of ₹ 36,36,200/- instead of ₹ 22,92,000/- as awarded by learned Claims Tribunal. The enhanced amount of compensation shall carry interest @ 8% p.a. from the date of filing of claim application till its realization. 6 / 6 • Any amount paid to the appellants-claimants pursuant to the impugned award shall be adjusted from the amount of compensation as calculated above. • Rest of the conditions as imposed by the Claims Tribunal in the impugned award shall remain intact.
Decision
18. Consequently, the appeal is allowed in part and the impugned award is modified to the extent as indicated herein-above. pwn Sd/- (Parth Prateem Sahu) Judge