M L BURMAN Vs. SHYAMSUNDER SINHA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This appeal has been filed by the employers of the respondent, under Section 30 of the Workmen's Compensation Act, 1923 (Act No. 8 of 1923), against an order directing them to pay Rs. 1680/- to the respondent as compensation, as claimed by him.

(2.) The case arose out of an accident bv which the respondent was injured on the 29th July, 1963. According to the respondent's case, made out in his application filed under the Workmen's Compensation Act. while he had been deputed to acquire information of accidents in various departments and workshops, an iron rod had pierced his foot as a result of which he had been permanently partially disabled, causing loss of earning capacity to the extent of fifteen per cent. According to the employers, the respondent was not a workman within the mean-ing of the Workmen's Compensation Act and, therefore, he was not entitled to compensation. The Sub-divisional Officer acting as an authority under Section 15 of the Act has come to the conclusion that the employee in question was a workman within the meaning of the Workmen's Compensation Act.

(3.) The oral evidence adduced on behalf of the respondent may now be summarised. He has examined himself as witness No. 1 and he has deposed that since 1946 he was a clerk in the Rohtas Industries Limited and he had been transferred to the Office of the Factory Manager and had been given factory duty also. He had been given a cycle for this purpose at the relevant time and he had met with the accident in question in the workshop while he was carrving some papers for reconciling accident cases. According to his next witness, named Ram Prasad Singh, the respondent worked in the Office but frequented the factories also in connection with the enquiries into accidents on behalf of the management. He had to go to the places of accidents also. According to a third witness, Rajendra Prasad, the respondent had been frequently sent in the Sugar Factory in connection with verification of accident reports. This witness had met with an accident roundabout 1961 and the res-pondent had gone for enquiry in his case. Substantially on this evidence, the respondent claimed that he had been employed otherwise than in a clerical capacity, although he called himself a clerk in the Rohtas Industries Limited. According to the witness examined on behalf of the employers, named Sri P. P. Jain, the respondent was in the Factory Manager's Office, working as a clerk. He maintained reports of accident etc. and his job was of a clerical nature. Upon this evidence, the employers resisted the respondent's claim of compensation under the Workmen's Compensation Act. It will now be necessary to refer to the show cause petition filed by the employers, as certain details mentioned in paragraph 10 of that petition had been put to the respondent, specifically in cross-examination. Paragraph 10 of the show cause petition runs thus :--