RAJ RANI Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The present appeal, under Sec. 23 of the Railways Claims Tribunal Act, 1987 (for short, the 'Act') is directed against the order of the Railways Claims Tribunal, Chandigarh Bench dtd. 30/7/2015, has been filed by the appellant/claimant, who is the mother of the deceased-Pawan Kumar.

(2.) The Tribunal has declined to grant the claim of compensation on account of the fact that from the record, the credibility of the evidence of the appellant was doubtful regarding the incident and the manner in which it had happened and when the brother had been informed and when he reached Yamunanagar to take the deceased to PGI. It was also observed that the ticket had not been recovered and therefore, as the mother was not travelling with the deceased, she could not tell as to how Pawan Kumar was travelling on a train as a passenger and from where to which place and when he had purchased the ticket and resultantly, in the absence of a valid and bona fide travel ticket, issue No.1 qua bona fide aspect of a passenger was held against the appellant.

(3.) Similarly, on issue No.2, it was held that under Sec. 123 (c) (2) of the Railways Act 1989 (for short, the '1989 Act'), it was not a case of untoward incident of falling down from any train. In the postmortem report, the injuries mentioned of the weapon used had been blunt and it could not be said that it was on account of falling from a train as merely because the GRP personnel present had stated that he had fallen from the train but he himself was not an eye-witness and therefore, the said issue stood in favour of the Railways. The issue of dependency, as such, of the claimant was upheld and resultantly, the claim for relief was declined.