KANTI DEVI Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS first appeal is filed under Section 23 of the Railway Claims Tribunal Act, 1987 impugning the judgment of the Tribunal dated 31.10.2011 by which the claim petition filed by the appellant was dismissed.

(2.) THE facts of the case are that appellant is a widow of deceased Sh. Ram Sewak who is said to have died in an untoward incident of falling from the train on 30.10.2008 when deceased Ram Sewak was travelling from Sahibabad to Aligarh Jn. by a train no. GNP -3 on the basis of a journey ticket no. 80144904. The case as pleaded by the appellant is that since there was a heavy rush in the compartment, the deceased fell down from the train when the train started with jerk/jolt and the thrust from the passengers, and this resulted in his death,

(3.) A reading of the aforesaid paras shows that the incident in question is not an incident of falling down from a train because if the deceased had fallen down at the station from the train then surely, there would be if not few eye witnesses, at least one eye witness, who would have made a statement before the railway authorities; including the railway police, of the deceased having been fallen down from the train. Besides the fact that there is no such statement of any eye witnesses, on the contrary, the respondent/Railways led evidence of its two employees as RW -1 and RW -2, alongwith the train register and which showed that the driver of train no. 2056 had informed that a person had got run over by a train. There is no reason why independent/neutral railway officials will have a reason to state a lie that the deceased got run over by the train and not by falling down from the train. This aspect is to be taken alongwith the fact that there is no eye witness of the alleged fall of the deceased from the train and which was bound to otherwise be because the incident is stated to have happened at the Sahibabad Railway Station. Accordingly, I do not find any fault in the conclusion of the Tribunal that though the deceased was found to have been carrying a ticket, really death took place while the deceased was trying to cross the tracks at the Sahibabad Railway Station.