FAO No.649 of 1998 -1- IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH FAO No.649 of 1998 DATE OF DECISION: February 28, 2011 SMT. KAMLA AND OTHERS ...APPELLANTS VERSUS SUKH MAHINDER PAL SINGH AND OTHERS ...RESPONDENTS CORAM: HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE K.KANNAN. 1. Whether reporters of local papers may be allowed to see the judgement? No 2. To be referred to the reporters or not? No 3. Whether the judgement should be reported in the digest? No ---- PRESENT: MR. J.S. DUHAN, ADVOCATE FOR THE APPELLANTS. MR. MANAV BAJAJ, ADVOCATE FOR MR. SUMEET GOEL, ADVOCATE FOR RESPONDENTS NO.1 AND 2. MR. MANMOHAN SINGH, ADVOCATE FOR RESPONDENT NO.3. K.KANNAN, J.(ORAL) 1. The appeal is against the award of dismissal rejecting the claim on the ground that the insured's vehicle was not shown to have been involved in the accident. 2. The accident was a result of the collision with the scooter the deceased was driving on the night at 9.00 p.m. on 26.10.1994. The FIR that had been lodged on the following day was that some unknown truck probably a tractor had dashed against the deceased and had fled past that place. A criminal case had been registered and six months later two persons volunteered themselves as persons who claimed that they had known about the accident. One was PW3 by the name of Sajjan Singh and another was FAO No.649 of 1998 -2- PW6 Bhim Singh. PW3 stated at the trial that he was going to Kaithal from Uchana in the insured's truck and one Satnam was the driver of the truck. He later corrected himself to state the name of the driver was Sukh Mander Pal Singh. He stated that on that day yet another person was seated in the truck by the name of Bhim Singh and said Bhim Singh had loaded buffaloes in the truck. He stated that he did not lodge any report with the police station the next day either at Kaithal or at Narwana or Barwala or Uchana, the places where he had gone immediately after the accident. He admitted in the course of cross-examination that 4-5 months after the accident he came to know that the scooterist had died that night and that the police recorded his statement an year before the trial of the case on 18.7.1996. PW6 gave evidence to the effect that he was transporting buffaloes on that day and he had noted the name of the driver and the registration in his diary, when he was cross-examined as to how he remembered both the details. The suggestion was that the deceased had related to him which he denied. He also admitted that he did not get the FIR registered and that he made a statement to the police at Narwana on 27.10.1994. It was even suggested to the witness that he had never engaged or hired the truck for loading buffaloes to Uchana to Kaithal. 3. The driver himself examined to say that he was falsely implicated and that his vehicle was never involved in the accident. Surprisingly, it was not even suggested to the driver that PW3 and PW6 travelled on that day and no attempt was even made to remind him that on that he had transported buffaloes on a contract from Bhim Singh. The Tribunal dealt with the discrepant evidence and the unnatural conduct of persons who had not reported to police for nearly 5-6 months from the date FAO No.649 of 1998 -3- of accident and who showed up for the first time after a long time before the police and who gave evidence in Court with inconsistent versions relating to the name of the driver and also the particulars relating to the accident. 4. The Tribunal has given as many as 7 reasons for rejecting the evidence of the witnesses. I see the judgement well reasoned and I have even an additional reason to give, that even the names of PW3 and PW6 have not been suggested to the driver of the vehicle as having travelled in the truck at the time of accident. There is no scope for taking a different view and I affirm the finding of the Tribunal and dismiss the appeal. 5. It shall be open to the claimants to apply to the Government in a scheme set forth under Section 163 of the Motor Vehicles Act for receiving a lump-sum grant from the corpus maintained by the State. If such an application is filed, it shall be safe if the authority refers to this judgement as proving that it was resulted in a motor accident in a hit and run case and make it the basis for disbursing the compensation. The period spent by the claimant for proceedings before the Tribunal and this Court would be taken as to exclude any period of limitation prescribed for claiming the amount under the Scheme. 5. The appeal is dismissed with the observations made above. February 28, 2011 (K.KANNAN) Gulati JUDGE