MADAN, J. - (1.) THESE two cross appeals filed under S. 110 D of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1939 arise out of an Award dated 21. 4. 1988 passed by Motor Accident Claims Tribunal, Tonk in Motor Accident Claim Petition No. 8/1982; whereby an Award amounting to Rs. 60,000/- has been passed against the appellants and proforma respondent No. 5 in S. B. Civil Miscellaneous Appeal No. 147/88. Appeal No. 147/88 has been filed by State of Rajasthan and Deputy Director Agriculture (Extension) Tonk, against the claimants and the driver for setting aside the Award dated 21. 4. 1988 and Appeal No. 105/88 has been preferred by driver Bashir Khan against the claimants and the appellants in Appeal No. 147/88, for setting aside the above Award. Both these appeals are disposed of by this single judgment, since they arise out of the same Award as indicated above.
(2.) BRIEF facts giving rise to these appeals are that a motor accident took place on 3. 1. 82 at about 6. 15 p. m. involving Jeep No. RJX 1894 which was being driven by Bashir Khan Driver, appellant in appeal No. 105/88, who was at the relevant time in the employment of Director Agriculture, Government of Rajasthan, Jaipur. In the said accident one person Isar son of Mangilal victim of the accident, lost his life. The dependants of the deceased Isar, namely, Mst. Bhooli widow of Mangilal (mother of the deceased), Mst Prahaladi widow of the deceased, Ramlal and Sohan both minor sons of the deceased under the guardianship of their mother Mst. Prahaladi, filed a claim petition before the Motor Accident Claims Tribunal, Tonk. The claimants claimed an amount of Rs. 1,92,600/- against the State and the driver of the Jeep Bashir Khan. The learned Tribunal after examining ocular as well as the documentary evidence led before it, passed an award on 21. 4. 1988 whereby a sum of Rs. 60,000/-was awarded in favour of the claimants and against the State and the driver of the Jeep. Aggrieved by the said Award both the above appeals have been filed in this court as indicated above. The case of the claimants briefly stated, is that on 3. 1. 1982 at about 6. 15 p. m. Isar (deceased) and Ramlal (PW. 4) were going on their cycles from Bada Kuwa towards Ghantaghar, Tonk. The driver of the jeep came suddenly from the front side driving Jeep No. RJX 1894 so rashly and negligently and by driving the said Jeep towards wrong side, he came close to the cycles driven by Isar and Ramlal and hit the cycle of Isar deceased who as as result of which fell down from the cycle and sustained injuries on his nose and ears which started profusely bleeding. Thereafter Ramlal PW. 4 lodged a report with the police station. A site plan of the place of incident was also prepared by Ramsingh vide Ex. P. 2 Dr. V. D. Sharma had medically examined the deceased vide injury report Ex. A. l. The Jeep in question was a Government Jeep belonging to State Agriculture Department viz. office of respondent No. 2, Deputy Director, Agriculture (Extension) Tonk. The victim Isar was rushed to hospital, Jaipur where he succumbed to his injuries. The claim was filed by the dependants of the deceased Isar before Motor Accident Claims Tribunal, Tonk wherein they claim a sum of Rs. 1,92,600/- towards compensation. The claim petition was contested by the State by denying the negligence of the driver of Jeep in question and by putting the blame on the deceased and Ramlal PW. 4 by contending that the accident had occurred on account of negligent manner in which the deceased and Ramlal were driving their cycles and not on account of negligence of the jeep driver. It was however, admitted that at the time of accident the jeep in question was Government vehicle belonging to the Agriculture Department of the State being driven by Bashir Khan driver, which at the time of accident was proceeding for fetching the diesel from his office towards Petrol Pump. On the fateful day the road was in the state of repairs and half of the road was closed to traffic and the driver of the jeep had stopped the jeep in question prior to the accident. Deceased Isar and his companion Ramlal had lost the balance of their cycles and they were coming on the wrong side and both had collided with each-other and subsequently the deceased had hit the jeep with his cycle from behind and at the time of accident the deceased was smelling of liquor. Bashir Khan driver also denied his culpability by contending that the accident had occurred not on account of his negligence but on account of negligence of the deceased and Ramlal PW. 4 and hence the claim petition deserves dismissal. On the pleadings of the parties the learned Tribunal framed the following issues :- 1. Whether the deceased Isar had died as a consequence of the rash and negligent driving of the jeep RJX 1894 which was being driven by Bashir Khan driver? 2. Whether the claimants are entitled to compensation and if so to what extent? 3. Relief? With regard to issue No. l evidence was tendered on the record by proving the site plan on the basis of which a specific finding has been recorded by learned Tribunal to the effect that the. driver Bashir Khan was driving the jeep so rashly and negligently by coming on the wrong side, whereas the deceased and Ramlal PW. 4 were driving their cycles on the right side on the road and hence it was the driver Bashir Khan who is fully responsible for the said accident which had occurred solely on account of his negligence. The Tribunal has examined in detail the evidence tendered on the record with specific reference to the evidence of PW. 4 Ramlal who was accompanying the deceased at the time of accident. According to the said witnesses, both the deceased as well as Ramlal PW. 4 were going on their cycles when a Jeep came from the opposite side and was being driven so rashly and negligently that notwithstanding the fact that both the deceased as well as Ramlal tried to save themselves by going on their left side yet they were hit by the jeep which resulted in injuries on the right ear of the deceased Isar as a result of which he started bleeding. The driver after accident stopped the jeep and after putting Isar deceased in the jeep rushed to the hospital. Subsequently F. I. R. was lodged by Ramlal PW. 4 with the local police on 3. 1. 1982, i. e. , on the date of occurrence itself. The accident was proved by FIR as well as site plan Ex. P. 2 prepared by the investigating officer. It has been stated by PW. 4 Ramlal in his cross-examination that the driver of the jeep was driving the jeep on wrong side whereas the deceased and the witness himself were going on their right side on the road and it was as a result of the negligence of the driver who hit the deceased as a consequence of which the deceased sustained injuries on his right ear and evidently it has been proved that Bashir Khan driver of the jeep was responsible for the. accident which had occurred on account of his negligence. On the basis of evidence on record, the learned Tribunal recorded finding that in the site plan it is correctly mentioned that the jeep in question after coming from wrong side had hit the deceased which fact is established from the evidece of PW. 4 Ramlal and the said evidence is plausible. Both on the evidence as well as the findings of the learned Tribunal, it has been thus established on the record that the accident had occurred not on account of the negligence of the deceased and PW. 4 Ramlal in driving their cycles but on account of the negligence of the driver of the jeep Bashir Khan who was driving the jeep on wrong side on the road as a result of which the victim had succumbed to the injuries received in the accident. The learned Tribunal has further recorded a specific finding to the effect that merely because the deceased was drunk at the time of the accident would not absolve the accused from culpability, since the accident had taken place on account of his negligene. With regard to issue No. 2 the following questions were formulated by the Tribunal for consideration : - 1) what was the span of life of the deceased? (a) Reasonable expectency of the life of the legal heirs of the deceased, (b) Reasonable expectency of the life of the deceased and his legal heirs. 2) What was the daily, weekly and monthly income of the deceased at the time of his death out of which how much the deceased was spending on himself and how much on his legal heirs and what was the financial loss to the legal heirs as a consequence of the death of the deceased and whether the deceased was spending any special sum on himself?
(3.) ON the above questions arising out of issue No. 2, learned Tribunal has recorded a finding that the deceased was 30 years of age and would have lived for another 35 years i. e. , 65 years had he not met with untimely death. The mother of deceased was 55 years of age and would have lived for another 10 years. ON the question of monthly income of the deceased the deposition of the father of the deceased Mangilal PW. l is to the effect that the deceased was having annual income of approximately Rs. 12,000/- and was also doing the labourer's job in the fields and was having no other occupation. To the same effect is the deposition of PW. 2 Prahaladi, mother of the deceased. In the absence of any direct evidence regarding the income of the deceased, the learned Tribunal came to the conclusion that the daily earnings of unskilled labourer would be minimum Rs. 14/- and if calculated on that basis monthly income would come to Rs. 400/- approximately. The learned Tribunal has further recorded a finding that out of Rs. 400/- the deceased must be spending atleast Rs. 200/- p. m. on his family members while the remaining amount on himself. With regard to the age of the wife of the deceased, learned Tribunal has recorded a finding that Mst. Prahaladi, wife of the deceased was 25 years of age as on the date of death of her husband and had been consequently put to a loss of Rs. 200/- p. m. on account of untimely death of her husband and on the principle of multiplier of age it comes to 25x2400 amounting to Rs. 60,000/-as held by the learned Tribunal. I am of the opinion that learned Tribunal has gone wrong in applying the multiplier of 25x2400 because span of life of the deceased should have been taken as 65 years by calculating age of the deceased the multiplier of 35 should have been applied, since the deceased was 30 years of age on the date of his death and would have lived for another 35 years, i. e. , 65 years. Therefore, the multiplier of 200x12x35 should have been applied by learned Tribunal which comes to Rs. 84,000/ -. I am further of the opinion that the claim petition is exaggerated to the extent of Rs. 1,92,600/-, since there is no positive evidence on the record with regard to monthly income of the deceased and the oral evidence of the witnesses does not help the claimants to an increased amount as demanded by them in their claim petition before learned Tribunal. The deceased had apart from two minor children aged 13 and 11 years respectively, wife of the deceased had also conceived a child in the womb and consequently learned Tribunal passed an Award of Rs. 60,000/- out of which I have been informed that a sum of Rs. 30,000/- has already been received by the claimants by way of compensation. On behalf of respondent Nos. 1 to 4 (claimants) cross objections were filed in this court under 0. 41 R. 22 C. P. C. read with Sec. HOD of Motor Vehicles Act for enhancement of compensation of the award amount to Rs. 1,92,600/ -. as against the awarded amount of Rs. 60,000/- in terms of Award passed by learned Tribunal on 21. 4. 88. During the course of hearing it was contended by Shri N. K. Jain, learned counsel for claimants, that the Tribunal had committed illegality in multiplying compensation for only 25 times. He has further contended that in the facts and circumstances of the case and also keeping in view the increase in the span of life as of today, reasonable expectancy of life should have been considered to be 65 years and if the same would have been considered by learned Tribunal, then the claimants were entitled to the compensation for 40 years and multiplier of 40 ought to have been applied since the widow of the deceased Mst. Prahaladi was only 25 years of age at the time of the death of the deceased. It has been further contended that learned Tribunal committed illegality in not accepting the income of the deceased to be Rs. 10,000/- to 12,000/- per year inasmuch as from the statement of PW. l Mangilal it was clear that the income of the deceased was about Rs. 12,000/- per annum. on this basis learned counsel contended that it was a fit case wherein minimum income of the deceased ought to have been considered at Rs. 1000/- p. m. as per the claim petition the calculation for compensation ought to have been done on the basis that he was infact contributing atleast Rs. 500/- p. m. on his family. It has been further contended that learned Tribunal has committed illegality in not awarding the interest on the Award amount in view of the latest decision of the Apex Court awarding interest at the rate of Rs. 12% per annum from the date of claim petition till the date of realisation and in one of the cases this High Court has passed an order that in case the payment is not made within the stipulated period than the rate of interest will be 18% per annum. It was consequently prayed that cross-objections should be accepted and the Award of the learned Tribunal dated 21. 4. 88 be modified to Rs. 1,92,600/-with interest and cost. ;