IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH FAO No.1199 of 2009 (O&M) Date of decision:06.09.2010 United India Insurance Company Limited ....Appellant versus Inderjit Kaur and others ...Respondents II. FAO No.1191 of 2009 (O&M) Inderjit Kaur and others ....Appellants versus Swinder Singh alias Shinda and others ...Respondents CORAM: HON’BLE MR. JUSTICE K. KANNAN ---- Present: Mr. Gopal Mittal, Advocate, for the appellant in FAO No.1199 of 2009 and for respondent No.3 in FAO No.1191 of 2009. Mr. Vipin Mahajan, Advocate and Mr. Rajkaran Singh, Advocate, for the appellants in FAO No.1191 of 2009 and for respondents 1 and 3 in FAO No.1199 of 2009. Mr.KBS Mann, Advocate, for respondent No.2 in FAO No.1199 of 2009. Mr.Rajeshwar Singh, Advocate, for respondent No.1 in FAO No.1191 of 2009 and for respondent No.4 in FAO No.1199 of 2009. ---- 1. Whether reporters of local papers may be allowed to see the judgment ? 2. To be referred to the reporters or not ? 3. Whether the judgment should be reported in the digest ? ---- K.Kannan, J. (Oral) 1. In FAO No.1199 of 2009, the Insurance Company is in appeal against liability and in FAO No.1191 of 2009, the claimants are in FAO No.1199 of 2009(O&M) - 2 - appeal against the quantum. On the issue of liability, although the Insurance Company had contended that the driver did not have a valid driving licence, it did not prove such a defence although the burden of proof was heavily on the insurer. Before the Appellate Court, an application has been filed for reception of additional evidence that makes reference to a verification said to have been made by the surveyor and loss assessors of the Insurance Company who had secured an endorsement in his letter that the driving licence had not been issued by the office of the Licensing Authority, Khadur Sahib. This communication from the licensing authority to the surveyor, in my view, will not afford any evidentiary value to the contention of the insurer and cannot mean that the insurer has effectively discharged his burden of proof. I, therefore, reject the contention that the driver was not duly licensed to drive the vehicle. 2. The learned counsel also contends that the multiplier adopted by the Tribunal for a person aged 52 years, could not have been 12 and the appropriate multiplier would have been only 11. This contention hinges on the issue of quantum which, in my view, the insurer is not entitled to join issues with. 3. Counsel for the insurer also stoutly contends that the vehicle was alleged to have been transferred by the owner of the motor vehicle involved in the accident. This he refers to the fact by the evidence tendered by the registered owner that he had transferred the vehicle to yet another person. No details of transfer except his own affidavit was filed. There is nothing for the claimants to take notice of an alleged transfer FAO No.1199 of 2009(O&M) - 3 - which is not borne through the records as far as the claim of third parties are concerned. The insurer would therefore be still liable. I am addressing this only to show that the insurer cannot obtain any better right to deny liability. I hold that the person arrayed as the owner was indeed the owner and there was no proof that the vehicle had been transferred to any other person. 4. The case now fall to be considered only as regards the just compensation as sought for by the claimants. The deceased was a lawyer and it is urged on behalf of the claimants that he was a practitioner of 25 years standing and he was earning an income of Rs.25,000/- per month. If he had earned as much, he should have paid income tax but admittedly he was not an income tax assessee. If he was a lawyer, he ought to have had account books but even account books relating to his fee receipts were not produced before the Court. At least the fact of filing of cases could have been brought forth as evidence through his munshi or through Court records as to the number of cases which he filed, for the Court to elicit an approximate income. In the absence of all the materials, the Trial still took the annual income to be Rs.50,000/- which, in my view, was appropriate. He left behind a widow and two children and the Tribunal took 1/3rd deduction and adopted a multiplier of 12. I cannot fault the Tribunal in the manner of assessment of compensation for the relatively fragile evidence offered by the claimants. The Tribunal has assessed a total compensation of Rs.3,96,000/- and another Rs.4,000/- towards funeral expenses and rounded it off to Rs.4 lakhs. I retain the award and dismiss the appeal for enhancement. The appeal both by the FAO No.1199 of 2009(O&M) - 4 - insurer and the claimants are dismissed affirming the decision of the Tribunal. (K.KANNAN) JUDGE 06.09.2010 sanjeev