MOTILILA PRUTHVIRAJ GAJBHIYE Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an appeal filed under sec. 23 of the Railway Claims Tribunal Act, 1987 by the dependents of one Shri Pruthviraj Gajbhiye, being aggrieved by the judgment and order dtd. 21/12/2020 passed by the Railway Claims Tribunal, Nagpur rejecting their claim application No. OA(IIu)/NGP/22/ 2019 for compensation on account of death of Shri Pruthviraj Gajbhiye in a purported untoward incident.

(2.) It is the case of the appellants that the appellant No. 2 i.e., the son of the deceased Shri Pruthviraj Gajbhiye, who was in private service, had on 28/2/2018 informed his father that he was coming to Nagpur on 1/3/2018 for Holi festival and told his father to come to receive him at Ajani Railway Station. This has been recorded in an affidavit dtd. 27/1/2020 of Smt. Motilila widow of deceased Pruthviraj Gajbhiye, who states that the aforesaid fact was communicated to her by her deceased husband. It is stated in the said affidavit that the deceased went to Ajani Railway Station on 1/3/2018 to receive their son Sawan and met with an accident caused by Train No. 12723, Telangana Express and died on the spot. That when her son arrived at Ajani on 1/3/2018, he had no knowledge of the accident of his father and because he had not found his father on station, he came home. As deceased Prithviraj Gajbhiye had not returned home, the wife and the son tried to search for him, after which they came to know that an accident had taken place at Ajani Railway Station and an unidentified body was kept in the mortuary, which was identified by her son Pawan. It is only then she came to know that her husband had died in a railway accident. That thereafter, the body was sent for post-mortem and then handed over to them for cremation.

(3.) A platform ticket has been produced, which is of 1/3/2018, 15.37 hours No. UFA 18302453, translation whereof is at page A-49 in the record and proceedings and it is stated to be a platform ticket recovered from an unknown dead person. It is on this basis, the appellants preferred a claim application for compensation under sec. 124A of the Railways Act, 1989 (the "Railways Act").