Dismissed

Iliyas v. Smt. Suman Saini and 5 Others

Allahabad HC24 Jul 2018FAFO/2424/2015

Case brief

AI extract

What is this about?

Civil appeal filed by a tractor owner against an award by the Motor Accident Claims Tribunal granting compensation to dependents of deceased persons killed in an accident involving the tractor. The court rejected the appeal, holding the appellant failed to prove non-involvement of his vehicle or contributory negligence.

What did the court decide?

Statutory amount of Rs. 25,000 deposited with the court shall be remitted to the Tribunal for adjustment towards the award.

Iliyas Vs Smt. Suman Saini and 5 Others — Motor Accident Claims | Allahabad HC (2018)

¶1

Court No. - 26

¶2

Case :- FIRST APPEAL FROM ORDER No. - 2424 of 2015

¶3

Appellant :- Iliyas Respondent :- Smt. Suman Saini And 5 Others Counsel for Appellant :- Sumati Rani Gupta Counsel for Respondent :- Nipun Singh

¶4

Hon'ble Ajit Kumar,J.

¶5

Heard learned counsel for the parties and perused the material placed on record.

¶6

This appeal under Section 173 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 is directed against the judgment and award dated 4th July, 2015 passed by the Motor Accident Claims Tribunal/ Additional District Judge, Saharanpur in M.A.C.P. No. 125 of 2014, wherein, compensation to the tune of Rs.2,90,000/- has been awarded in favour of the claimants-respondents along with interest at the rate of 7% from the date of filing of the claim petition till the date of actual payment.

¶7

Admittedly, the appellant is the owner of the tractor which has been found to be involved in the accident and resulted into the death of the two injured persons who were on the motorcycle which was hit by the tractor. Initially, the defence taken before the Tribunal by the appellant was that his vehicle was not at all involved in this accident and it had been falsely implicated in the present case although the first information report was lodged but the appellant before the Tribunal continued disputing the theory of the accident. It is during the course of investigation, the police found that the tractor of the owner, namely, the appellant, was involved and he had two tractors under his ownership which he, subsequently admitted and tried to confuse the colour of two tractors, one of which was involved in the accident.

¶8

So far as the negligence part is concerned of the motorcycle of the deceased, since the appellant had disputed the accident, no evidence was adduced by him to demonstrate that it was the case of contributory negligence also and to that extent he was not liable to compensate the claimants. The Tribunal ultimately, after going through the ocular evidence recorded findings of fact to the effect that the deceased suffered fatal injuries on account of rash and negligent driving of the tractor and hence, the tractor not being insured, the liability has been fastened upon the owner of the tractor to pay the compensation to the claimants.

¶9

The argument advanced before this Court in the appeal is that the Tribunal has failed to consider the site plan and technical report which sufficiently demonstrate the non-involvement of the vehicle in the first instance and secondly the site plan shows that it is the motorcycle that had dashed into the tractor. In the opinion of the Court the appellant can take only one stand either there is no involvement of the vehicle in question and that it is a case of false implication of the vehicle or he admits that there has been an accident but his liability is to the extent of negligence of his driver. On perusal of the technical report of the motorcycle that has been noticed by this Court from the original records I find it is all about the condition of the motorcycle and the argument, therefore, is that if the situation of the accident is taken then the motorcycle must have suffered gross damage and, therefore, the accident itself sought to be doubted. I find that the argument is no more open to the appellant once it has come to be established before the Tribunal that the accident did take place and that the vehicle in question was involved.

¶10

On the question of site plan, the Court is of the opinion that the appellant has taken it as an alternative argument. It was always open for the appellant to have raised this plea before the Court first instance i.e. the Tribunal but neither from written statement nor, from any evidence it can be inferred even remotely that the appellant sought to raise the point of contributory negligence. At this stage of appeal much thrust has been placed upon site plan prepared by the police.

¶11

The circumstances, in which the accident took place and the first information report was lodged, the subsequent preparation of report of the site plan by the police, in my opinion, will not have such a significant bearing to hold the findings of the Tribunal regarding negligence as perverse. Nor, even the site plan can be a conclusive proof of manner of accident to determine responsibility.

¶12

No other point has been urged by the appellant.

¶13

The appeal lacks merit and is, accordingly, dismissed.

¶14

The statutory amount Rs. 25,000/- already deposited before this Court shall be remitted to the Tribunal for being adjusted towards the deposit to be made under the award.

¶15

Order Date :- 24.7.2018 Atmesh

Iliyas v. Smt. Suman Saini and 5 Others

Case brief

What is this about?

What did the court decide?

Iliyas v. Smt. Suman Saini and 5 Others

Case brief

What is this about?

What did the court decide?

What the court decided

A compact analysis

Issues for consideration

Statutes considered

Parties & counsel

Coram

Case details

Similar cases

Smt.Neelima Prajapati and Others Vs Desh Raj and Another

Sriram General Insurance Co. Ltd. Vs Dhanveer Singh and Another

National Insurance Company Ltd. Vs Beena and 4 Others

National Insurance Co. Ltd. Vs Smt. Mithlesh Alias Kamlesh and Others

Amar Singh Vs Rajesh Kumari and 5 Others

Smt. Shobha Saxena Vs State of U.P. and Others