Balbir Kaur vs Manjinder Singh

Anita Chaudhary, J.—Appellant in this appeal is seeking enhancement of the compensation awarded to her by the Motor Accident Claims Tribunal, Rupnagar vide award dated 08.03.2013. The appellant is disputing the split multiplier applied by the Tribunal and seeks enhanced compensation for loss of consortium and funeral expenses and addition of compensation on the head of loss of love and affection.

Santokh Singh met with an accident on 15.03.2012. A claim petition was filed by his wife. Santokh Singh was serving as a Beldar in P.W.D. (B&R) Ludhiana and was 59 years old. The salary of Rs. 25,516/- is not in dispute. A deduction towards income tax was made after making a deduction of 1/3rd towards personal expenses, the multiplier of 9 was applied. The multiplier was split into 1 year and 8 years as Santokh Singh was to retire after a year. It was held that after retirement, the family pension would have been half of the salary, therefore, 50% of the salary was taken into account and multiplier of 8 was applied. Rs. 10,000/- was awarded towards loss of consortium and Rs. 5,000/- was allowed towards last rites. A total of compensation of Rs. 10,15,000/- was awarded. No relief towards future prospect was allowed considering the age of the deceased.

The contention raised on behalf of the appellant is that the Motor Accident Act does not envisage a split multiplier and the Hon''ble Apex Court in Puttamma and Others Vs. K.L. Narayana Reddy and Another, has held that in the absence of any specific reason and evidence on record, the Tribunal or the Court should not apply split multiplier in routine course and should apply the multiplier as in Smt. Sarla Verma and Others Vs. Delhi Transport Corporation and Another, . It was urged that only a small amount towards loss of consortium and funeral expenses had been allowed and as per Vimal Kanwar and Others Vs. Kishore Dan and Others, , Rs. 1,00,000/- should be awarded towards loss of love and affection and Rs. 25,000/- as funeral expenses. Reliance was also placed upon Sri. K.R. Madhusudhan and Others Vs. The Administrative Officer and Another, .

On the other hand submission is that the Single Bench of this Court had split the multiplier which was approved by the Division Bench in Oriental Insurance Company Ltd. Vs. Saroj Devi and others, .

It is not disputed that the deceased was 59 years old at the time of accident. He would have retired after few months. After retirement he would be on pension which would be 50% of the last pay drawn, therefore, the multiplier on the full salary could not have been allowed for all the 9 years and the Tribunal had given a reason for splitting the multiplier.

I have gone through the judgments referred to by the appellant. In Puttamma''s case (supra) the Apex Court had held that in the absence of specific reason the Court should not apply the split multiplier. The Tribunal had given a specific reason that in the case of a Government employee, on retirement gets pension which is calculated at half of the last drawn salary and the remainder multiplier is worked out on the 50%. The compensation for the remaining period could not be treated as full salary period and has to be treated as the period during which the deceased would have received pension and no change can be made.

So far as the enhancement on account of loss of consortium and funeral expenses is concerned the appellant is entitled to enhancement in view of the judgment passed by Hon''ble Apex Court in Rajesh and Others Vs. Rajbir Singh and Others, . The Tribunal had allowed Rs. 10,000/- towards loss of consortium, therefore, a sum of Rs. 90,000/- more is awarded on the heads of loss of consortium. Rs. 20,000/- additionally is allowed towards funeral expenses as the Tribunal had awarded only a sum of Rs. 5,000/- for funeral expenses. Additionally, a sum of Rs. 1,00,000/- is added for love and affection. The total of this comes to Rs. 2,10,000/-.

The appeal is partly allowed. The above amount shall be paid by the Insurance Company within two months, failing which the appellant would be entitled to this amount with interest as was allowed by the Tribunal from the date of appeal.