UNION OF INDIA Vs. RAJ RANI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This appeal by the Union of India under Section 173 of the Motor Vehicles Act is directed against the award of the Motor Accident Claims Tribunal, Una, in MAC Petition No.24/1999, decided on 25.3.2002.

(2.) The brief facts of the case are that Pritam Chand, husband of claimant Raj Rani and father of Reeta Rani and Dharam Singh, was aged 43 years. He was earlier serving in the Indian Army and after his retirement was employed as Constable in the Himachal Police. On 20.11.1997, he was going to Chamba to join his duty when he took a lift in truck No. 65655, belonging to the General Reserve Engineers Force (GREF) of the Union of India. The said vehicle met with an accident at a place called Gulabgarh and the deceased died as a result of the injuries sustained therein. The defence taken by the present appellants was the deceased alongwith about 20 other civilians had forcibly got into the truck and they had threatened the driver and due to the threatening posture of the civilians travelling in the truck, the driver of the truck lost control of the truck which resulted in the accident. The other plea raised by the Union of India is that in the vehicle in question no civilians could have been carried and the driver was not supposed to carry any passengers and, therefore, the employer is not vicariously liable, even if it is held that the deceased had been taken on board by the driver with his consent. In this behalf Mr. Sandip Sharma, learned Assistant Solicitor General of India, argues that the area in question i.e. Gulabgarh in Doda District of Jammu and Kashmir is an insurgency prone area and, therefore, carrying of civilians in such vehicle is strictly banned.

(3.) The first question which is to be decided is whether the driver had been terrorized to carry the passengers. Unfortunately, the claimants led no evidence. In fact, the claimants could have led no evidence since they were not on the spot. The driver of the vehicle and one other witness have been examined. According to them, the driver alongwith three other employees of the Union of India were travelling in the truck. The rations were being carried in the rear of the truck. About V% km from Gualabgarh, the truck was forcibly stopped by about 20 civilians who forcibly got on to the truck and sat on the top of the ration. The deceased was a part of this group of persons. The driver then states that after going some distance he saw another vehicle belonging to the GREF. Therefore, according to him, he wanted to stop the vehicle so that he could remove the civilians who had forcibly climbed on to his truck. According to him, one of the civilians threatened him with a knife and as such he lost control over the vehicle and the accident occurred. He also states that he was to take some other route but the civilian persons who had forcibly boarded the truck forced him to take the road wherein the truck was being driven.