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Judgment
D.V. Shylendra Kumar, J.—The appeals filed by the Insurance Company u/s 31 of the Workmen''s Compensation Act, 1923 (hereinafter referred to as ''the Act'' for short) are more an harassment to the claimants who will be either an employee got injured, or dependents of a deceased employee, who would have died during the course of employment.
The present appeal arises out of one such claim petition by the wife, two minor children and the mother, of a deceased workman, presented u/s 10 of the Act before the Commissioner for Workmen''s Compensation, Mysore District, Mysore, (for short commissioner) numbered as WCA.FC.CR. No. 165/2004, due to the death of their bread winner viz., one Kumara who was working as a cleaner in a vehicle owned by S. Chandra and driven by one Krishnegowda and the vehicle having been insured with the appellant/Insurance Company - New Indian Assurance Company, who have been arrayed as respondent Nos. 1, 2, and 3 respectively, in the claim petition. After the contest by the owner and the insurer, the Commissioner allowed the petition and awarded a compensation for a sum of Rs. 3,11,970/- with interest at 12% per annum from 28.10.2004.
Aggrieved by this order and award of the Commissioner, the present appeal by the Insurance Company alone, u/s 31 of the Act.
The appeal though filed in the year 2005 with a delay of 5 days, is yet to elicit admission as even when this Court had directed issue of notice to respondents on the application for condonation of delay, the appellant has not ensured the service of notice of the application on all respondents and this state of affairs has continued for a period of five years and today the matter is listed before the Court on the office note put up by the Registry, "regarding filing of sub-service application for respondent No. 5"?
It is noticed, that the registry has listed the matter for orders regarding filing of sub-service application as the notice of appeal issued to the respondent No. 5, who incidentally may not be a respondent of any significance, as he is the first respondent in the claim petition namely the driver, who will neither shoulder the liability nor in any way advance the case of the applicants, having not been served. In spite of the same, the appellant has neither taken necessary steps for service of notice on respondent No. 5 nor has thought it proper to give up respondent No. 5.
Having regard to the fact that respondent No. 5 herein was the driver of the vehicle in which the deceased was stated to be working as cleaner, he was not a very necessary or proper party to a claim petition u/s 10 of the Act before the commissioner. Therefore, non service of notice on respondent No. 5, cannot be a ground to keep this appeal pending, nor could have been the reason to ordering this appeal without being admitted for 5 long years!
Be that as it may. We find the present appeal has not been prosecuted with any degree of diligence as the appeal is yet to see the light of the day even for admission.
A claim petition u/s 10 of the Act is to alleviate the sufferings and loss of an employee who gets injured during the course of the work or of the dependents of the employee, who unfortunately dies during the course of employment.
In the present appeal, learned Counsel for the appellant has tried to impress upon us that there are several questions of law, worthy of examination within the scope of the Section 30 of Act. We are not very moved by this submission particularly for allowing an appeal of this nature, to languish in the High Court for more number of years, which only results in real harassment and agony to the claimants and in the instant case, who are the dependents of a deceased person.
The claimants had some ray of hope by the award of the Commissioner and that has remained a mirage and not a reality as the appellant - Insurance Company has filed this appeal and the amount under dispute which should have been deposited before the Court below, instead, with the permission of this Court, has been deposited before this Court which does not serve any purpose and definitely does not sub serve the object or intention of the Act.
In the peculiar circumstances, we find there is absolutely no bonafides on the part of the Insurance Company in prosecuting the appeal. Therefore we dismiss the appeal itself without going into the further merits on the application for condonation of delay or the merits of the appeal.
We direct the amount in deposit before this Court to be transmitted to the Commissioner for Workmen''s Compensation, forthwith and the same to be disbursed to the claimants in accordance with the award.
Accordingly, the appeal is dismissed.