Case: National Insurance Co.Ltd Vs. Om Prakash Jain

Accordingly, the State Commission allowed the appeal and directed the Insurance Company (appellant herein) to pay compensation of Rs.61,255/with interest at the rate of nine per cent from the date of filing the complaintThe National Commission dismissed the appellants revision by a rather short order and held that the State Commission was right in observing that the insured was not in a position to verify whether the original licence issued in 1987 was fake.

Reasoning: In our view, the orders passed by the State Commission and National Commission are liable to be set aside because the findings recorded by them on the issue of validity of driving licence are legally untenable. In National Insurance Company Limited vs. Laxmi Narain Dhut [2007 (3) S.C.C. 700], it has been clearly laid down that the decision in the case of National Insurance Company Limited vs. Swaran Singh & Anr. [2004 (3) S.C.C. 297] has no application to the cases other thany risks and where originally licence was a fake, renewal thereof cannot validate the same. In the present case, the complaint was filed for damage of the vehicle of the insured and not the third party risk. The District Forum and State Commission have concurrently held that the original licence of the driver was fake. This being the position, the District Forum was justified in dismissing the complaint and the State Commission committed an error by awarding compensation to the respondent.