Madras High Court: The Division Bench of Pushpa Sathyanaryana and S. Kannammal, JJ., revised the amount of compensation awarded to the claimant in a motor accident claim and enhanced it from Rs 30,89,430 to Rs 83,35,000.
Instant appeal was preferred challenging the decision and decree of the Motor Accident Claims Tribunal.
Deceased was proceeding in a two-wheeler, driver of the lorry drove the vehicle in a rash and negligent manner, dashed against two-wheeler. Due to the said impact, the deceased sustained injuries and died.
In view of the above, legal heirs – appellants/claimant of the deceased filed claim petition.
Insurance Company submitted that the accident occurred due to the carelessness and negligence on the part of the deceased and the deceased had not possessed any valid driving licence.
Tribunal, after considering the oral and documentary evidence, held that the accident had occurred due to the drunken driving of the deceased and also because of the rash and negligent driving of the driver of the first respondent and fixed the liability at 50:50.
Analysis, Law and Decision
High Court noted that in the post-mortem report no mention about the presence of alcohol was there.
Court added that having failed to prove that the accident occurred due to the drunken driving of the deceased, contributory negligence of 50% could not be attributed to the deceased.
From the sketch placed on the investigation report, it represented that the deceased was going from South to North on the left extreme of the road and the offending vehicle, namely, the lorry which was coming in the opposite direction hit the deceased and he died. Therefore, even on that ground, negligence cannot be attributed to the deceased.
For proving an offence under Section 185 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988, breath test is mandatory as per Section 203 of the MV Act.
Since the above was not satisfied, it was concluded that the deceased was not in a drunken state.
10% was deducted from the compensation on the ground that the deceased did not possess the valid driving licence
For the above contention, it was stated that he had only a learners licence. It is not the case of the second respondent that a person having LLR cannot ride on the road.
Though it is stated that a person having LLR and riding or driving should have an Instructor with them, it does not disqualify a person from riding a vehicle.
Award of the Tribunal was enhanced to Rs 83,35,000 from 30,89,430.[Kuralvani v. Kathirvelan, 2021 SCC OnLine Mad 2232, decided on 31-03-2021]
For Advocates before the Court:
For Appellants: Mr.I.Pinaygash
For R – 2 : Mr.B.Rajesh Saravanan