DUJAI BAI Vs. STATE OF U.P.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS appeal under Section 110-D of the Motor Vehicles Act is directed against the order of the Motor Accident Claims Tribunal (District Judge, Hamirpur) dated November 3, 1979.

(2.) THE accident in question took place allegedly on 2/3 August, 1974. The place of the accident is described as near village Dharaon district Hamirpur. As a result thereof the husband of the claimant-appellant died. The vehicle involved in the accident, according to the appellant, was Bus No. UPI 9107 belonging to the State Roadways. The claim petition was lodged on April 7, 1978. The claimant made an application on 7th April, 1978 accompanied with her affidavit in explanation of the time taken in lodging the claim. No counter affidavit to this application or affidavit appears to have been filed from the other side but the Tribunal did not find the ground satisfactory and on this basis passed order declining to condone the delay in making the claim. The claim petition has, therefore, been dismissed under the impugned order on account of being barred by limitation alone. Aggrieved the claimant has preferred this appeal.

(3.) THE claimant, it would appear, is Smt. Duji Bai described as aged about 55 years in the claim petition filed on April 7, 1978. Evidently she is old, infirm and illiterate. In the affidavit which she filed on 7th April, 1978 along with the claim petition, it is averred that her husband having met with death on August 2/3, 1974, she gave papers to the concerned State Roadways Office and the Superintendent of Police, Hamirpur. An assurance was extended to her that the matter was receiving consideration and that she shall receive the compensation in due course. Being illiterate herself she put faith on this assurance. On 6th April, 1978 she was advised that she has to prefer a claim in the appropriate Tribunal und hence she came up with the claim petition. As mentioned above, there was no counter affidavit filed from the other side in rebuttal to these factual averments. The averments in question are on their face convincing and there is nothing which may be taken to be inherently incredible in relation to the same. She went upto the Roadways authorities subsequent to the accident in which her husband was the victim and claimed compensation whereupon she was given to understand that the matter was under consideration and she, therefore, remained under the expectation that she might receive the amount in due course of time. It was not required of her in this connection to specify the particulars of the counsel as commented by the Tribunal who may have given her the advice on 6th April, 1978 referred to in the affidavit. There is apparently no lack of bona fides on her part and the circumstances of the case are such that she should have been granted benefit of limitation in this behalf.