(1.) IN all these appeals, the common defence raised by the Insurance Companies is that they are not liable to pay compensation to a third party, injured or the legal representatives of the deceased, on the ground that the driver of the offending vehicle, insured with them, did not possess a valid and effective driving licence, required licence for that kind of vehicle, not renewed the licence, at the time of accident and thus, there is a breach of policy condition and violation of statutory provisions of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988.
(2.) DURING the course of hearing of these appeals, when the learned counsel for the Insurance Companies were posed with a question as to why, the Insurance Companies file appeals, when they are given liberty to recover the amount from the insured, and consistently raise a plea to avoid their liability to pay compensation to third party accident victims, inspite of definite pronouncement by the Larger Benches of the Supreme Court in National Insurance Co. Ltd., v. Swaran Singh reported in 2004 ACJ 1, Oriental Insurance Co. Ltd., v. Meena Variyal reported in 2007 ACJ 1284 and other cases, as well as Division Bench judgments of this Court, it is the uniform reply of the learned counsel appearing for the Insurance Companies that even after, Larger Bench decisions in the above referred cases, the Supreme Court, in some of the judgments has totally exonerated the Insurance Companies of their liability to pay compensation to third party accident victims.
(3.) IN law of precedents, it is a well accepted principle that a Larger Bench decision will prevail over a Smaller Bench decision and even if there is a conflict of decisions of Co -equal Benches of the Supreme Court, it would be appropriate for the High Courts and lower Courts to follow those judgements of the Supreme Court, where the Apex Court had considered and decided the issues, in conformity with the object and scheme of the Act, particularly, when specific issues are raised, elaborately and precisely dealt with and answered in the judgment, with reference to statutory provisions of an enactment, on the basis of which, the lis rests. In the backdrop of the above principles, issues raised in the present appeals are dealt with.
ABOUT US "REGENT COMPUTRONICS PVT. LTD." is a Company incorporated in 1991 under the provisions of the Companies Act, 1956. Since its inception to 1995, the Company was busy in carrying out the activities related to various Banks' Job Work..
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