mwsgu Lamgg m mm HIGH coum 01? mxcuvm Am Mmsrua: (LG. ‘MlscELLmEous AEPEAI. HoQ‘lW/L‘on' 2003 W sc o s ER sE a: on MOTOR mIGLES AGE. 19§§~ 4PP¢118m ' Unitea India. Insurance Go.Ltd., ¢E¢n-apyliaantf Ehrpugh Branch Hanager, Branch '09...” Office, Bajmal complex, 53.“ Kamti Line, Bainandgaon (24 mnsvs Mithilesh Kumar S/o Naray'an irasad EarilHarno, aged about 23 years, R/o Gandhi Chowk, Ward No.22, Ehena Baaanthpur, mahsu an District Rsjmndg’aon(ce).. ; -- Non-appljsgnt nod Jethmal Jam §/o Eukhraa Jain, aged 44 years, Occupatnnn business, Raanendgaon, R/o Eah Vardhman & Dist Hagar, Raanand- A mu ——Non-appli¢a.nt no , 2 Shalmn Ba: Nail: Wd/G Araunlal aéed about 28 years. Shekpr m So Late Araunlal Ku.Draupaai D/a Late Arjunla aged abaut 6 yearn, Ku.Sa.a‘é@, 3/0 Late Arj‘unlal, aged about 3 years. No.4 to 6 minors, through vali mather and Natuta'l guardian shakun Bai Wd/O ArjaunlB-lo Mu Ram 3/0 ’Gajaru Ha‘lba, age& about 65 years, Contd. . 2 I . . ‘ / l HIGH COURT OF CHHATTISGARH : BILASPUR W M. A. No. 1182 of2003 ‘ ?\ Appellant United India Insurance Co. Ltd. Versus RespOndents Mithilesh Kumar 6a others MISC. APPEAL UNDER SECTION 173 OF THE MOTOR VEHICLES ACT DB: Hon’ble Shri I. M. Quddusi & Hon’ble Shn' N. K. Agarwal, JJ '\~ Shri Sanjay S. Aganval, Advocate for ths appellant. Non for the responder'lts, tiespite service ofnou'ce. ORDER {Oral} ( Passed on this 22nd day of September, 20 10 ) Per I. M. Quddusi J. Heard. l. The instant appeal arises from the award dated 13th October, 2003, ‘ oaSSed by the First Additional Motor Accident Claims Tribunal, Rajnandgaon in Claim Case No. 14/2003. The appellant has got permission under Section 170 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988. / v 2. The facts, in brief, are that on 1.11.2002 at 10.00 p.111. in the night when Constable Aljun Lal, along with his colleague Puranik Lal was going to Rajnandgaon for attending his duties on a motorcycle, at that time near Sahaspur Dalli — Gopalpur Khurd road a vehicle — lndica Car, bearing registration No. C.G. 08/0109, being driven in a rash and negligent manner by the respondent No.1, hit the motorcycle, thereby accident has taken place. In that accident deceased Aijun Laldied on the spot. 3. The respondents No. 3 to 8/claimants, being legal heirs of the deceased i.e. widow, son (aged 9 years), daughter (aged 6 years), daughter (aged 6 years), father and mother, respectively, had filed a claim case for award of a total compensation of Rs. 18,70,000}— under various heads. Learned Tribunal having regard to the facts and circumstances, the evidence on record and the age of the deceased as well as u dependents, awarded the total compensation of Rs. 9,25,000/ - along with 9%Vsimple interest, per annum, from the date of application i.e. a 21, 1.2003. It was fulthcr directed that if the amount of compensation ‘ ’ is not paid within one month £rom the date of the passing of the award, the unpaid amount shall carry interest at the rate of 12% per annum. While reaching to the aforesaid conclusion, lealned Tribunal has taken into consideration the yearly loss of dependency as Rs. 54,000f— and applying the multiplier of 17, the total compensation for loss of dependency was granted as Rs. 9,18,000/ -. In addition to that, Rs. 5000/— was awarded to the widow towards consortium and Rs. 2000/ - towards funeral expenses. Learned counsel appearing for the appellant submits that the M.A.C.T. concerned has wrongly made deductions of 1/5‘1“ of the income, it should have been 1/3rd of the income of the deceased. On perusal of the papers it is apparent that the income of the deceased was assessed on the basis of the salary slip of the month of December, 2001, whereas the accident had taken place in the month of November, 2002. According to the salary slip of December, 2001 the salary of the deceased was Rs. 5368/-. We cannot Overlook the benefit of future pay commissions, grant of increments, increase in dearness allowance etc., considering the future prospects of the deceased, who was in] government service in the Police Department and there is no doubt that the salary of the deceased would have become not less than Rs. 12,000/— p.m. after the sixth pay commission report w.e.f. January, 2006. The Tribunal, having assessed the monthly income of the deceased as Rs. 5,500/—, has made 1/5th deduction, against which the appellant Insurance Company filed this appeal alleging that the deductions should have been made 1/3rd instead on 1/5th towards personal and living expenses of the deceased. Hon’ble Supreme Court in U. P. State Road Transport Corporation and others Vs. Trilok Chandra and othersl in paragraph 15 held as under : “15. We drought it necessary to reiterate the method of .working out ‘just’ compensation because, 5f late, we have noticed from the awards made by tribunals and courts that the principle on which the multiplier method was developed has been lost sight of and once again a hybrid method based on the \\. l (1996) 4 sec 362 s (7 subjectivity of the Tribunal] Court has surfacai, introducing uncertainty and lack of reasonable uniformity in the matter of determination of compensation. It must be realized that the Tribunal/Court has to determine a fair amount of compensation awardable to the Victim of an accident which must be proportionate to the injury caused. The two English decisions to which we have referred earlier provide the guidelines for assessing the loss occasioned to the victims. Under the formula advocated by Lord Wright in Davies, the loss has to be ascertained by first determining the monthly income of the deceased, then deducting therefrom the amount spent on the deceased, and thus assessing the loss to the dependants of the deceased. The annual dependency assessed in this manner is then to be multiplied by the use of an appropriate multiplier. Let us illustrate: X, male, aged about 35 years, dies in an accident. He leaves behind his Widow and 3 minor children. His monthly income was Rs. 3500. First, deduct the amount spent ’on X every month. The rough and ready method hitherto adopted where no dennite evidence was forthcoming, was to break up the family into units, taking two units for an adult and one unit for a minor. Thus X and his wife make 2+2=4 units and each minor one unit i.e. 3 units in all, totaling 7 units. Thus the share per unit works out to Rs. 3500+7=500 per month. It can thus be assumed that Rs. 1000 was spent on X. Since he was a working member some provision for his transport and out—of—pocket expenses has to be estimated. In the present case we estimate the out—of—pocket expense at Rs. 250. Thus the amount spent on the deceased X works out to Rs. 1250 per month leaving a balance of Rs. 3500-1250: Rs 2250 per month. This amount can be taken as the monthly loss to X’s dependents. The annual dependency comes to Rs. 2250x12= Rs. 27,000. This annual dependency has to be multiplied by the use of an appropriate multiplier to assess the compensation under the. head of loss to the dependants. Take the appropriate multiplier to be 15. The compensatiOn comes to Rs. 27,000 x 15; Rs.4,05,000. To this may be added a conventional amount by way of loss of expectation of life. s Earlier this conventional amount was pegged down to Rs. 3000 but now having regard to the fall in the value of the rupee, it can be raised to a ngure of not more than Rs. 10,000. Thus the total comes to Rs. 4,05,000 + 10,000= Rs 4,15,000. ” \. Learned Tribunal relying on the above decision in Trilok Chandra (supra) has assessed the dependency in the term that in the present case two units each for Shakuni Bai i.e. the widow of Axjun Lal and father Baduram 8a mother Sukhi Bai, and one unit each for three minor children (applicants No. 2 to 4), and two unit of Aijun Lal, total comes to 11 unit, Therefore, on dividing the income of Arjun Lal i.e. Rs. 5,500/- by 11, value of per unit comes to Rs. 500/-. In this manner, the value of two unit of Arjun Lal comes to Rs. 1000/ -, on deducting this sum from the total monthly income of Rs. 5,500] -, the assessment of loss of dependency of the applicants comes to Rs. 4,500] — monthly, meaning thereby Rs. 54,000] — yearly. In Sarla Verma (Smt) and others Vs. Delhi Transport Corporation and another2 in paragraph 30 the Hon’ble Apex Court has observed that “Though in some cases the deduction to be made towards personal and living expenses is calculated on the basis of units indicated in Trilok Chandra, the general practice is to apply standardized deductions. Having considered several subsequent decisions of this Court, we are of the View that where the deceased was married, the deduction towards personal and living expenses of the deceased, should be one third (1]3Td) where the number of dependent family members is 2 to 3, one fourth (1]4‘11) where the number of dependent family member is 4 to 6, and one-nfth (1]5th) where the number of dependent family members exceeds six. Having considered the facts and circumstances, the material available on record, and the well settled law, as above, we do not nnd any merit in this appeal, which deserves to be and is dismissed, accordingly. . 3‘ ff Sdl- . r \ LM.Quddusi , ,, . . $6.!" .. Thakur Judge Ls. s \t,.u. N.K.Agai‘wa‘ Judge ,ix 2 (2009)6 SCC 121 s \