ORIENTAL INSURANCE CO. LTD. Vs. MAMTA DEVI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE Insurance Company is on appeal on points which do not require any re -appraisal. There are two contentions raised; viz., that the claimants had stated the income of the deceased around Rs. 4,000/ - but the tribunal had taken the income at Rs. 5400/ - and that it has also provided for prospect of future increase. I have seen through the judgment and I find that the claimants had placed evidence of Field Officer of the Construction Company where the petitioner was working. He was said to be a Press operator and the claimants themselves had given evidence that he was a welder. He was surely a skilled worker and if there was actual evidence from the employer of the salary that he was earning, it was appropriate that the tribunal acted on the documentary evidence produced before it and took that the basis for providing compensation.

(2.) THE further grievance of the insurer is that the tribunal had relied on the judgment in Santosh Devi Vs. National Insurance Co. Ltd. and others : (2012) 6 SCC 421 to provide for prospect of increase when the deceased was not having a settled employment. The counsel would refer me to a decision in National Insurance Co. Ltd. Vs. Pushpa and others in SLP No. 8058 of 2014 where the Court has referred the matter of a prospect of increase as a ground for assessment to compensation to a large Bench and the stay which has been granted in that case is cited before this Court as a justification for securing an admission. The Insurance Company will not indulge in any such adventurism before this Court to assume that an interim stay granted in individual dispute as operational through out India. In all cases, the Insurance Company is bound to accept what has come through law so far and if in the nature of employment it was found that he was a skilled worker and there were surely a prospect of increase, that cannot be a subject for re -appraisal now. If there has been any doubt as regards the law relating to making provision for future increase, it is with reference to premium for 15% increase for persons aged above 50 years. Even then, there is an observation by the Supreme Court in Rajesh and others Vs. Rajbir and others : (2013) ACJ SC 1403 that the provision could be made in private employments or self employments where government regulations relating to age of superannuation may not apply. There is no necessity for application of this principle in this case.