BHAGABANTI Vs. GENERAL MANAGER EASTERN RAILWAYS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Mr. Mukberjee who has appeared for the appellant in this case realised that on the facts appearing from the evidence he had a difficult task to perform and accordingly he tried to obtain a decision in favour of his client by relying upon a pure question of law. What that question is, I shall state presently.

(2.) The facts are that one Bhagabanti applied to the Commissioner for Workmen's Compensation for compensation on account of the death of her husband, one Bideshi Rajbhor, who was alleged to have died by an accident arising out of and in the course of his employment under the respondent. Bidoshi was employed as a gang coolie under the Railway. He had been ill for some time, but had rejoined work after about a month's absence. On 10/7/1953, he went to work at about 8 a. m., but when his wife went to reach him his food at about midday, she found him lying dead near the railway lines within the yard of the Burnpur Railway Station. According to her, there was blood on the face of the dead body and also on the ground near about the place where it lay. The ease made by her in her application for compensation was that her husband had died by a puncture of his liver and other internal organs as a result of a serious stroke received from a shovel with which he was working and of a consequent fall on the railway lines. The manner in which the accident had happened was said to be that the shovel had slipped from the railway lines and the plates while the deceased was working with it. The daily wages of the deceased were said to have been Rs. 65.00 per month and on that basis a claim for a sum of Rs. 2,100.00 was made.

(3.) The Railways did not deny that the deceased had been employed as a workmen under them, but they denied that he had died by an accident arising out of and in the course of his employment. According to them, the death had been due to natural causes.