GOVIND DAS Vs. YAQUB KHAN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) PETITIONERS are the parents of the boy Mohan Lal, aged 17 years, who died on being crushed by the rear wheel of a water tanker propelled by a tractor, in the early hours of the morning of 14. 5. 1983. The parents filed claim petition against the driver and owner of the tractor-cum-tanker alleging that the accident was on account of rash and negligent driving of the vehicle. The Tribunal rejected the claim on the ground that rashness or negligence of the driver has not been established. This order is now challenged.

(2.) THERE are certain admitted facts in the case. A mass marriage ceremony took place in a hostel complex. There was a shamiyana put up. Some sides of the shamiyana were evidently removed and the tent cloth was lying in heaps on the ground. Deceased Mohan Lal was sleeping on the ground. There is a controversy as to whether at the time of accident he was lying on the tent cloth or under the tent cloth. The adjoining road lies north-south. The tractor-cum-tanker came along the road and turned towards the hostel compound. It moved forward with a view to empty the tanker. The rear wheel of the tanker ran over the head of the sleeping boy and he was crushed to death.

(3.) ACCORDING to the claimants, the boy was sleeping over the tent cloth and he would have been visible to the driver if he had taken the slightest care to be on the look-out, more so when at 5 a. m. in summer, there would be sufficient light. The stand taken by the driver was that there was no one sleeping on the tent cloth which lay on the ground and that he asked the people assembled there to remove the tent cloth and they asked him to drive over, it was later found that the boy was wrapped in or lying underneath the tent cloth and was not visible and thus there was absolutely no rashness or negligence on his part.