1 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT BOMBAY CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION FIRST APPEAL NO. 1677 OF 2008 FIRST APPEAL NO. 1677 OF 2008 FIRST APPEAL NO. 1677 OF 2008 IN (MISC. APPLICATION NO. 86 OF 2007) (Railway Claim Tribunal, Mumbai). Smt. Vaishali Vijay Salke & Ors. ...Appellants (Orig.Applicantsd) Versus The Union of India .. Respondent (Orig. Respondent) Mr.G.J.Mohan Rao, Advocate, for the appellants. Mr. J.J.Pandian, Advocate, for the respondent. CORAM: J.H.BHATIA,J. CORAM: J.H.BHATIA,J. CORAM: J.H.BHATIA,J. DATE : 17th September,2008. DATE : 17th September,2008. DATE : 17th September,2008. P.C. P.C. P.C. 1. With consent of the learned Counsel for the parties, the Appeal is taken up for final hearing and disposal at the stage of admission itself. 2 2. Admit. 3. The appellants filed the claim petition before the Railway Claims Tribunal at Mumbai on the ground that Vijay Sadashiv Salke,who was son of the appellant nos. 3 and 4, the husband of appellant No.1 and father of appellant NO.2 had fallen down from the local train near Ulhasnagar Station and died on the spot on 26.10.2005. The claim petition was filed on 10.4.2007 with an application for condonation of delay. The learned Member of the Railway Claims Tribunal however, without discussing any reasons for delay in filing the claim petition beyond the period of limitation of one year, dismissed the application as well as the claim petition under Rule 16 of the Railway Claims Tribunal Rules on the ground that the claim of the petitioners is not corroborated by the Station Master. Being aggrieved by that order, the appellants have preferred the present Appeal. 4. Rule 16 of the Railway Claims Tribunal (Procedure) Rules, 1989 provides that the Tribunal may, after considering the application,summarily dismiss the application, if for reasons to be recorded, the Tribunal is of opinion that there are no sufficient grounds for proceeding therewith. The Railway Claims Tribunal, 3 while dismissing the application and claim petition itself, observed that as per prayer para 6(b), the deceased had fallen down from a local train near the Ulhasnagar Station and died no the spot. In support of the same, several documents, including the documents from the Railway authority and the police were filed. He noted that as per the Station Master’s memo, deceased was knocked down by a local train at Km 57/15 Ulhasnagar and this is corroborated by Inquest Panchnama. Thus according to the petitioners, who were naturally not present at the time of incident, deceased Vijay had fallen down from the local train and had died, while as per the Station Master’s memo, deceased was knocked down by a local train and had died on the spot. It is surprising and shocking to note that with such material, the Claims Tribunal observed that "obviously sufficient grounds are not available for proceeding with the claim petition". It appears that the Railway Claims Tribunal did not understand the purpose of the provisions of Section 124A of the Railways Act which are meant to provide compensation to the legal representatives of the persons who had died in untoward incident in the course of working in railway and summarily dismissed the claim without giving opportunity to the claimants to lead evidence. 4 5. It is material to note that the Railway Claims Tribunal did not utter a word in the whole order as to why the delay in filing the claim petition could not be condoned. Section 17 of the Railway Claims Tribunal Act, 1987 provides that where the claim is filed under Section 13(1-A) for the purpose of compensation, the claim application should be filed within one year from the date of occurrence. However Section 17(2) provides that notwithstanding anything contained in sub-section (1), an application may be entertained after the period specified in sub-section (1) if the applicant satisfies the Claims Tribunal that he had sufficient cause for not making the application within such period. This discretion has been given to the Claims Tribunal to condone the delay if sufficient cause is shown. On perusal of the application for condonation of delay, it appears that the applicants have specifically stated that they, being uneducated and not aware of the procedure of law, could not obtain certified copies of the accident within the period. When they had approached an Advocate, then only they came to know that certified copies of the documents are required to be file alongwith the claim petition. Therefore, they approached the police for certified copies and the same was supplied on 12.12.2006. By that time, the applicants Nos. 3 and 4 - parents of the deceased had 5 left Ulhasnagar for their native place and therefore, their signatures could not be obtained on the claim application. Due to these reasons delay was caused. In view of the fact that the applicants are poor and illiterate people and they wanted compensation for the death of the only earning member of their family, the delay could have been condoned on humanitarian ground. As noted above, the Claims Tribunal did not even consider any of these other grounds while rejecting the application. In my opinion, the impugned order passed by the Railway Claims Tribunal is liable to be set aside. 6. Therefore, the appeal is allowed. The impugned order is set aside. The delay in filing the application is hereby condoned and the matter is remanded back to the Railway Claims Tribunal for adjudication on its own merits after giving an opportunity to the concerned parties to lead necessary evidence. (J.H.BHATIA,J.) (J.H.BHATIA,J.) (J.H.BHATIA,J.)