The Supreme Court has awarded a whopping compensation of Rs 10.63 lakh to the road mishap claimants while taking a serious view of a family fighting a 20-year legal battle for compensation on the death of their sole bread winner in a road mishap.
A bench of Justices G S Singhvi and S J Mukhopadhya also directed an additional amount of Rs five lakh as costs to the family as the New India Assurance Company managed to obtain an ex-parte interim order in 2007 from the Supreme Court for paying Rs two lakh to the claimants until final disposal of its appeal.
Referring to the pendency of the case in the Supreme Court for the past five years, the bench said, “It should be a matter of concern for those who are associated with this institution as to why an ex-parte interim order passed by the court should continue to operate for years together without the matter being listed for effective hearing.”
Nanag Ram, who was riding a motorcycle, was killed after being hit by a truck in Jaipur on September 3, 1992.
”In the last almost 20 years the claimants – the aged parents, wife and five children of Nanag Ram, who became a victim of road accident in 1992, must have exhausted all their resources in prosecuting and contesting the litigation till the stage of High Court and they must not have been left with money sufficient for engaging an advocate in this court and also because in last almost five years, during which the special leave petition remained pending in this Court, they must have lost all hopes to get justice,” the apex court said.
“The claimants could get a paltry sum of Rs 2 lakh and they perhaps thought that it will not be worthwhile to spend money for contesting the special leave petition filed by the appellant,” it said in its order.
A bench of Justices G S Singhvi and S J Mukhopadhya also directed an additional amount of Rs five lakh as costs to the family as the New India Assurance Company managed to obtain an ex-parte interim order in 2007 from the Supreme Court for paying Rs two lakh to the claimants until final disposal of its appeal.
Referring to the pendency of the case in the Supreme Court for the past five years, the bench said, “It should be a matter of concern for those who are associated with this institution as to why an ex-parte interim order passed by the court should continue to operate for years together without the matter being listed for effective hearing.”
Nanag Ram, who was riding a motorcycle, was killed after being hit by a truck in Jaipur on September 3, 1992.
”In the last almost 20 years the claimants – the aged parents, wife and five children of Nanag Ram, who became a victim of road accident in 1992, must have exhausted all their resources in prosecuting and contesting the litigation till the stage of High Court and they must not have been left with money sufficient for engaging an advocate in this court and also because in last almost five years, during which the special leave petition remained pending in this Court, they must have lost all hopes to get justice,” the apex court said.
“The claimants could get a paltry sum of Rs 2 lakh and they perhaps thought that it will not be worthwhile to spend money for contesting the special leave petition filed by the appellant,” it said in its order.
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