NATIONAL INSURANCE CO LTD Vs. RAMESH CHANDRA PALARIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Chairmanthis is an appeal against the judgment and order dated 22.10.1998 passed by District Forum, Nainital allowing a sum of Rs.78,959/- as compensation in favour of the complainant.

(2.) The only point involved in this case is that the truck of the complainant met with an accident. The claim was lodged. It was repudiated. The complainant filed the complaint with the allegations that the driver of the truck was Shri Harak Singh Rawat while it proceeded from Haldwani, but while returning from Bageswar, Shri Harak Singh Rawat suffered from dysentery and he handed it over to Shri Dinesh Chandra for driving. When the truck met with an accident, Shri Dinesh Chandra was driving the truck. It is not disputed that Harak Singh Rawat was holding a valid driving licence but, it is said that Shri Dinesh Chandra was not holding a valid driving licence in so far as he was not authorised to drive the vehicle on hill routes. This fact is admitted to the parties that Shri Dinesh Chandra was not having a valid licence for driving the vehicle on hill routes. According to the complainant, he has entrusted a licence to driver Shri Harak Singh Rawat to drive the vehicle. But without the knowledge and information to the complainant, he has handed over the vehicle to an unlicensed driver, which was not in he knowledge of the complainant, therefore, the complainant should not suffer for that. The learned Counsel for the complainant referred a number of rulings, but the learned Counsel for the Insurance Company Mrs. Anjali Gosain argued that the liability is different in the case of third party claims and it is different for the damage to the own vehicle. It was argued that the driver is an agent of the owner and entrustment to an unlicensed driver by the actual driver shall mean entrustment by the owner and, therefore, the owner has to bear the loss.

(3.) The learned Counsel for the complainant referred to the ruling reported in Purushottam Kumar Jain V/s. Oriental Insurance Co. Ltd., 2002 1 CPJ 218, in which there was a claim for the own damage of the vehicle. It was held in this ruling: in view of the law declared by the Supreme Court in the cases referred above, applying the principle, in the own damage claim admittedly, the employer employed a licensed driver Pradeep Singh, who was driving the vehicle who was in control of the vehicle and even assuming for arguments sake he allowed Santosh to drive the vehicle, the Insurance Company cannot disown its liability to pay the own damage claim.