F.A.O.NO. 45 OF 2001 1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH F.A.O.NO. 45 OF 2001 Date of decision:22nd November, 2010 Oriental Insurance Company Limited, through its Regional Manager, Sector-17, Chandigarh. .......Appellant Versus Gurbax Kaur and others ........Respondents BEFORE: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE K.KANNAN Present: Mr. Ashwani Talwar, Advocate and Mr. Mrigank Sharma, Advocate, for the appellant. None for the respondents. 1. Whether Reporters of local papers may be allowed to see the judgment? Yes/No 2. To be referred to the Reporters or not?Yes/No 3. Whether the judgment should be reported in the Digest? Yes/No K.Kannan, J.(Oral) 1. This Court vide order dated 26.08.2010, allowed the Insurance Company the benefit of taking steps to summon the relevant records and evidence from the Licencing Authority at Chamba for hearing on 22.11.2010. The appellant has not taken any steps so far but the counsel states that the appellant sent a letter to the Registrar. I find the procedure adopted to be rather curious. The practice of sending letters of communication to the officers of the Court by the parties is deprecated and I take the opportunity given by F.A.O.NO. 45 OF 2001 2 this Court as unavailable to the appellant any further. 2. I do not think the case must be held up only o this account. 3. The liability of the Insurance Company as far as the enforcement of the claim at the instance of the claimants cannot any way be disputed even if the driving licence were held to be not genuine, by virtue of the law laid down by the Hon'ble Supreme Court in New India Assurance Co., Shimla v. Kamla,(2001) 4 SCC 342 and National Insurance Co. v Swaran Singh (2004) 3 SCC 297. The award in so far as the claimants are concerned is confirmed. 4. The issue for adjudication will therefore be only for an inter se dispute with regard to the validity of the driving licence that will have a bearing to the insurer for its right to enforce recovery against the insured, if the contention were to be accepted . The award of the Tribunal as regards the issue of driving licence is set aside and the matter remitted to the Motor Accident Claims Tribunal, Jalandhar for an adjudication on the aforesaid issue in accordance with law. 5. Parties are directed to be appeared before the Motor Accident Claims Tribunal, Jalandhar on 21.12.2010. [K.KANNAN] JUDGE 22nd November, 2010 Shivani Kaushik