Motor Vehicle Accident claim – Appellant met with an accident and his car turned upside down and fell in ditch – Appellant and co-passenger suffered injuries – Appellant felt that co-passenger needed immediate attention and left the car capsized in the ditch – In this state, one of the wires of the car caught fire and it got damaged substantially – Appellant lodged FIR – Surveyor assessed that the damage was occurred due to the appellant’s omission to take care of the vehicle – The State Commission allowed the complaint in full, however, the National Commission reduced the insurance amount: Held: On a careful scrutiny of the records of the case, it is seen that both the District and State Commissions had reached a concurrent finding about whether the delay in intimation to the respondent was justified – Both held that this delay was justifiable and not fatal to the insurance claim – Both the courts had also reached the finding that the damage took place in two phases: (a) once when the vehicle fell into a ditch and capsized; and (b) when the short-circuiting took place due to the car remaining in that state – The National Commission could not have interfered with pure finding of fact arrived at by the District and State Commissions while exercising revisional jurisdiction – It is unclear as to how the National Commission perceived that the State Commission exercised jurisdiction not vested in it or has failed to exercise jurisdiction vested in – There is nothing to indicate in the decision of the National Commission as to whether there is any illegality in the approach adopted by the State Commission or that it had acted with material irregularity – In the present case, no miscarriage of justice is made out by the respondent – The State Commission has addressed all the issues raised before it and found the delay in intimation to be reasonable and that the insurance claim is payable on the damage due to the accident as well as the short-circuiting – The State Commission also examined the genuineness of the accident’s claim by considering the police report and discarded the surveyor’s report for lack of evidence – It then directed the respondent to pay the entire insured sum giving its reasons for the same – Hence, the appellant is correct in stating that the National Commission has transgressed its jurisdiction by interefering with the State Commission’s order – As far as appellant’s omission to take care of the vehicle is concerned, the facts of the present case are amply clear that the appellant was acting under compelling circumstances when he had to take his co-passenger to a hospital immediately as his condition was precarious – It is not disputed that the co-passenger had also succumbed to the injury – It is also difficult to imagine that how he could have prevented short-circuiting of the vehicle which had fallen into a ditch – In any event, the respondent has not explained as to how the unavailability of the appellant during the said period has led to further damage of the vehicle and that burden heavily lies on the respondent and the same was not discharged – Therefore, the impugned judgment passed by the National Commission in Revision Petition is set aside and the judgment of the State Commission is restored. [Paras 12, 16, 18]
As published in the Supreme Court Reports, Supreme Court of India. Headnotes prepared by: Ankit Gyan National Insurance Co. Ltd. v. Ishar Das Madan Lal, (2007) 4 SCC 105 [2017] 11 SCR 893 : (2017) 9 SCC 724. Text from the Indian Supreme Court Judgments open data set (Dattam Labs), CC BY 4.0.
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