UNION OF INDIA Vs. SADHU RAM

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This application under Section 25 of the Provincial Small Cause Courts Act has been preferred by the Union of India which, as the owner of the South Eastern Railway Administration, was the defendant in a suit instituted by the plaintiff for recovery of Rs. 722.89 on account of loss of a consignment of three baskets of betel leaves booked at Howrah for delivery at Sini. The consignment was booked under P W Bill No. 054031 on the 23rd May, 1963. It reached the destination station on 26-5-1963, but it was found to have become absolutely rotten and unfit for human consumption and so it was destroyed under the advice of the railway doctor. The case of the plaintiff was that the consignment was damaged due to negligence and misconduct of the railway staff who took no care, as they were bound to do, to despatch the consignment, which was an article of perishable nature, by the next available train after the booking on 23-5-1963. The plaintiff, accordingly, instituted the present suit after serving the requisite notice upon the General Manager of the South Eastern Rail-way for a decree for the aforesaid sum.

(2.) The defendant resisted the plaintiff's claim alleging that no responsibility lay with the railways because the consignment was damaged not due to any negligence or misconduct on the part of the Railway Administration, but on account of inherent defect in the consignment itself. The defendant further pleaded that the consignment was despatched by the first available train as provided in Rule 163 of Appendix 'C' of the Standing Orders relating to Goods and Goods Vehicle The defendant also put forward the plea that the plaintiff's claim was highly exaggerated.

(3.) The learned Small Cause Court Judge has come to the conclusion that the consignment was not despatched by the first available means and that it became rotten and unfit for human consumption due to negligence and misconduct on the part of the Railway Administration. There was no inherent defect in the consignment. As regards the quantum of the claim, the learned Judge has decreed the suit for Rs. 540/ only.