SUHAWANI BURAH Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The present appeal has been preferred against the judgment dated 10.05.2012 passed in Case no.TAU/RNC/2002/0016 by the learned Member(Technical), Railway Claims Tribunal, Ranchi Bench (hereinafter referred as Tribunal) whereby claim of the appellants, i.e. wife and sons of the deceased-Nelson Burah, was rejected.

(2.) Learned counsel for the appellants has submitted that learned Tribunal has disbelieved the claim that the deceased was a bona fide passenger travelling on a valid ticket because A.W.2, B.B. Lugun could not say what was the fare from Tatanagar to Rourkella despite his assertion that he had seen the deceased purchasing the ticket and no railway ticket was recovered from the body of the deceased during preparation of the inquest report. It is submitted that the memo of Sr. Divisional Medical Officer, Chakradharpur (Annexure-1), F.I.R(Annexure-2) and inquest report (Annexure-3) were filed with the claim application and there is evidence on record that shows that the deceased had accidental fall from the train. It is argued that the learned Tribunal has rejected the claim on the basis of the memos and statement of the railway authorities that the deceased was leaning out of the door of the compartment due to which he sustained injury on the head on being hit by the over head electric pole where after the injured/deceased was brought to South Eastern Railway Hospital, Chakradharpur for treatment where he died on 25.06.2001.

(3.) It is argued that just because the ticket was not found on the body of the deceased, it cannot be inferred that he was not a bona fide passenger. It is submitted that even if the statement of the railway authorities has been relied upon by the Tribunal it supports the fact that the deceased was travelling on the train and he fell down from the train which comes within the purview of 'untoward incident' as defined under Sec. 123(c)(2) of the Railway Act. It is contended that the Tribunal has erred in holding that the manner of occurrence comes within the exceptions (a) to (e) as contemplated in the proviso of Sec. 124-A and the Railways are not liable to pay compensation. It is contended that the impugned judgment has been passed against the provisions of law and is fit to be set aside and the Railway is liable to pay the compensation.