NATIONAL INSURANCE CO LTD Vs. GOURI SENGUPTA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is a revision against the order dated 4.6.97 of the 1st Member, Moton Accident Claims Tribunal, West Tripura, Agartala in T.S. (MAC) 258/95 by which the learned 1st Member of the Tribunal did not permit the petitioner - Insurance Company to put some questions relating to the income of the deceased by way of cross-examination of the witness- respondent No. 1

(2.) The facts briefly are that the respondent No. 1 Smti. Gouri Sen Gupta filed an application under Section 166 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988, against the petitioner - Insurance Company as well as the respondent No.2 who is the owner of the vehicle No. TRL 3742 and the respondent No. 3 who is the driver of the said vehicle for compensation for death of her husband in a motor accident, and the said case was initially filed before the learned Member, Motor Accident Claims Tribunal, South Tripura, Udaipur and thereafter transferred to the 1 st Member, Motor Accident Claims Tribunal, West Tripura, Agartala and numbered as T.S. (MAC) 258/95. In the said case before the Tribunal, the respondent No. 1 examined herself as the claimant and when the counsel for the petitioner - Insurance Company sought to put a question relating to income of the deceased at the time of cross-examination of the respondent No. 1 the counsel for the respondent No. 1 objected to the said question contending that cross-examination by the petitioner - Insurance Company could only be confined to the defences available to it under sub-section (2) of Section 149 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988, (for short, "the 1988 Act"). Learned counsel for the petitioner - Insurance Company, on the other hand, contended before the Tribunal that though sub-section (2) of Section 149 of the 1988 Act restricted the defence of the Insurance Company to only those grounds specified therein, there was no restriction whatsoever in the said sub-section (2) of Section 149 of the 1988 Act on the right of the petitioner - Insurance Company to cross-examine a witness for the purpose of testing his veracity. The learned Member of the Tribunal however rejected the contention of the petitioner - Insurance Company holding that the cross- examination by the Insurer was also subject to restriction imposed under Section 149 of the 1988 Act.

(3.) Mr. B. Bhattacharjee, learned counsel appearing for the petitioner - Insurance Company contended in the hearing of this revision that a reading of sub-section (2) of Section 149 of the 1988 Act would show that no restriction as such has been put on the right of the Insurer to cross-examine a witness. According to Mr. Bhattacharjee, in the absence of such clear restriction, the Insurer was fully entitled under Section 146 of the Evidence Act to put any question to a witness which would test his veracity by way of cross-examination and the impugned order in so far as it deprived the petitioner-Insurance Company to put a question relating to income of the deceased by way of cross-examination is liable to be set aside.