Holding the municipal company liable, the Punjab and Haryana Excessive Courtroom has awarded a compensation of Rs 4 lakh to a widow and youngsters of a 53-year-old man who died 5 years in the past because of accidents after a tree fell on his auto-rickshaw.
A Bench of Justice Vinod S Bhardwaj stated, “with a purpose to meet the monetary hardship of the petitioners and noticing that the tree did fell upon the deceased Naresh Kumar and led to his premature demise and the identical certainly mirrored some extent of lapse or error in judgment by the respondent, an interim compensation of Rs 4 lakh is awarded to the petitioners”.
The order additional stated that the interim compensation shall be disbursed to the petitioners inside a interval of two months of the date of receipt of licensed copy of this order, failing which the petitioners shall be entitled to curiosity at 6 per cent each year on the quantity from the date of submitting of the petition.
The excessive court docket in the meantime clarified that the Chandigarh Municipal Company will nonetheless be entitled to hunt a set-off of principal out of the interim compensation from the quantity lastly awarded, however there shall be no restoration in case the compensation assessed by the court docket is lower than the interim compensation ordered.
The order was handed on a petition filed by Usha and her youngsters, looking for Rs 25 lakh compensation on account of dying of her husband, Naresh Kumar, because of what they considered negligence on the a part of the municipal company (MC).
The petition stated that Kumar, 53, was standing outdoors Authorities Faculty, Sector-37, Chandigarh, ready for the scholars/youngsters he used to select and drop off from their properties to the college and vice versa. On July 11, 2019, between 1.30 pm to 2 pm, when the auto-rickshaw driver was ready for kids in entrance of college in his three-wheeler, a tree fell down upon his auto, because of which he suffered accidents on his head. He was instantly taken to Authorities Multi Speciality Hospital, Sector 16, Chandigarh. As his situation was severe, he was referred to the PGIMER, Chandigarh, however on reaching, he was declared useless on arrival.
Kumar’s spouse submitted that her husband died because of “untoward incident and with none negligence on his half and solely because of negligence of the Chandigarh Municipal Company”.
Usha additional claimed the MC has quite a few features to carry out beneath the Punjab Municipal Company Act, 1976 however they’ve didn’t do their duties. She referred to Part 45 (d) of the Punjab Municipal Company Act, 1976, beneath which the planting and care of timber on roadside and elsewhere comes inside the ambit and features of the company. Nevertheless, “because of the poor upkeep” within the repairs of the town and “lack of care, pruning and upkeep of timber”, the incident has occurred, the petition claimed.
The Chandigarh civic physique, in its reply, denied any deficiency in its service. The MC counsel additionally submitted {that a} department of eucalyptus tree, which is said to have fallen, at the very best may very well be termed as an “surprising pure calamity or an act of God”, which couldn’t be foreseen by anybody.
The bench of Justice Vinod S Bhardwaj, whereas citing a judgement of the Supreme Courtroom within the case of ‘Sanjay Gupta and others versus state of Uttar Pradesh and others’, held that “a writ court docket might award compensation to an individual aggrieved and in opposition to the wrongdoer, on account of breach of its public obligation, along with the impartial proper of the aggrieved celebration to assert compensation beneath the personal legislation in a civil motion based mostly on tort”.
The excessive court docket famous that the MC Chandigarh has failed to ascertain that the timber had been pruned correctly and branches more likely to trigger hazard to the life and property had been eliminated, thus contributing within the prevalence because of a prima facie lapse.
