PROPRIETOR PURE DHANSAR COAL CO Vs. DEBENDRA NATH BHATTACHARJI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This appeal has been filed by the employer, the Proprietor of Pure Dhansar Coal Company and it is directed against the judgment of a learned single Judge of this Court dated the 22nd November, 1963, passed in Miscellaneous Appeal No. 248 of 1962. That appeal had been filed under Section 30 of the Workmen's Compensation Act, 1923 (Act No. 8 of 1923) by the present appellant and it was dismissed by the learned Judge.

(2.) The case has a chequered career as follows: The respondent had met with an accident on the 11th December, 1956, in a colliery owned by the appellant, where he was working as an electrician. By order dated the 14th August, 1958, the Commissioner under the Workmen's Compensation Act dismissed the respondent's claim to compensation. The respondent filed an appeal in this Court, which was numbered as miscellaneous Appeal No. 616 of 1958. By judgment and order passed by a Division Bench of this Court on the 23rd February, 1962, the appeal was allowed and the case was remanded to the Commissioner for re-consideration in accordance with the observations made by this Court in its judgment. Thereafter, the Presiding Officer, Labour Court, by his order dated the 14th July, 1962, has allowed compensation to the respondent amounting to Rs. 4900/- minus a sum of Rs. 411-9-3 pies, which the respondent had already received. Against that order the employer had come up in appeal to this court.

(3.) The short facts are as follows: --The respondent had alleged that on the llth December, 1956, he had been directed by Sri R. K. Mukherji, the Manager, and Sri Indra Kumar Agarwal, the proprietor of the Company, to take a pump and bed-plate into the colliery under ground on an open trolley and he has been asked to finish the work of fitting up the pump and bed-plate by 2 p. m. of that day. Accordingly, the respondent took those articles on a trolley by tying them with rope. At the place where the trolley was kept for fitting the pump, there was a sharp incline, and the trolley was kept stationery by means of a rope tied to the trolley. Some of the men were holding the trolley in position, but the rope gave way and the trolley began to move down fast and ultimately it dashed against the buffer throwing him down and causing him injury in the spine. It was alleged that as a result of the accident, the respondent was totally disabled and was incapable of doing any work. The appellant's case, amongst others, was that when the respondent had got on the trolley, he had been asked not to do so, and while the trolley was being held by ropes, the ropes slipped with the result that the trolley moved downwards and the respondent fell down.