13. In. Divisional Controller, KSRTC v. Mahadeva Shetty, the road accident resulted in paraplegia due to serious injury to the spinal cord. The Supreme Court held that the object of providing compensation is to mitigate the hardship and place the claimant as far as possible in the same position financially as he was before the accident. The quantum of damages fixed should be in accordance with the injury. An injury may bring about many consequences like loss of earning capacity, loss of mental pleasure and many such consequential losses. A person becomes entitled to damages for mental and physical loss, his or her life may have been shortened or that he or she cannot enjoy life, which has been curtailed because of physical handicap. The compensation awarded has to be 'just'' and not a bonanza. Every method or mode adopted for assessing compensation has to be considered in the background of "just" compensation which is the pivotal consideration. Though by use of the expression "which appears to it to be just", a wide discretion is vested in the Tribunal, the determination has to be rational, to be done by a judicious approach and not the outcome of whims, wild guesses and arbitrariness. The expression "just" denotes equitability, fairness and reasonableness, and non arbitrariness. A person not only suffers Injuries on account of accident but also suffers in mind and body on account of the accident throughout his life and a feeling is developed that he ■ is no more a normal man and cannot enjoy the amenities of life as another normal person can. The Supreme Court further held that while fixing compensation, suffering of the mind, shortening of life expectancy, loss of earning capacity, permanence of the disability, loss of amenities of life etc. are to be considered against the backdrop of age, marital status, unusual deprivation one has undertaken in one's life etc."
