2025:HHC:31677 IN THE HIGH COURT OF HIMACHAL PRADESH AT SHIMLA CMPMO No. 385 of 2023 Decided on : 15.09.2025 ICICI Lombard General Insurance Company Limited …Applicant/Petitioner Versus Smt. Usha Devi and another …Non-applicants/Respondents Coram Hon’ble Mr. Justice Ajay Mohan Goel, Judge Whether approved for reporting?1 For the petitioner : Mr. Jagdish Thakur, Advocate. For the respondents : Mr. Sanjeev Sharma, Advocate, for respondent No.1. Ms. Vandana Kuthiala, Advocate, for proposed respondent No.2. Ajay Mohan Goel, Judge (Oral) CMP No. 9592 of 2023 By way of this application, filed under Order 1, Rule 10 of the Civil Procedure Code, the applicant prayed for the impleadment of Commissioner of Income Tax, as respondent No.2. 2. Having heard learned counsel for the parties and in view of the averments made in the application, the same is 1Whether reporters of the local papers may be allowed to see the judgment? 2 2025:HHC:31677 allowed. Commissioner of Income Tax is ordered to be impleaded as respondent No.2. Registry is directed to make necessary correction in the memo of parties. Application stands disposed of accordingly. CMPMO No. 385 of 2023 3. Notice. Ms. Vandana Kuthiala, learned counsel, accepts notice on behalf of newly impleaded respondent i.e. respondent No.2. 4. By way of this petition, the petitioner has assailed order dated 23.12.2022, passed by MACT, Una, District Una, H.P., in Execution Petition No. 61/2019, in terms whereof, the Insurance Company has been directed to pay to the claimants the amount that has been deducted on account of TDS. 5. Learned counsel for the petitioner submitted that there is no illegality in the act of the petitioner for the reason that as a matter of procedure whenever payments are made, TDS is deducted. He further submitted that it is not as if the Insurance Company has retained the TDS, it has been deducted and paid to the Income Tax Department. He further submitted that in these circumstances, even if the order of the 3 2025:HHC:31677 Executing Court is to be complied with, then the TDS that has been paid to the Income Tax Department, be ordered to be refunded to the Insurance Company. 6. Having heard learned counsel for the parties, this Court is of the considered view that as the compensation which a party gets on account of claims under the Motor Vehicle Act, cannot be termed as income, therefore, deduction of any tax in the garb of income tax, is illegal. Thus the order of the learned Executing Court directing the Insurance Company to pay the claimants the amount of deducted TDS, cannot be faulted with. However, in light of the fact that this amount has been paid by Insurance Company after deduction to the Income Tax Department, obviously, the Income Tax Department also has no right to retain the same and it has to pay it back to the Insurance Company. 7. Ordered accordingly. Let the amount, that has been ordered by the Executing Court, be paid by the Insurance Company to the claimant and simultaneously, let the amount of TDS, which has been now paid to the Tax Department, be refunded back by the Income Tax Department to the Insurance 4 2025:HHC:31677 Company. Let needful be done by all the parties, within a period of six weeks from today. 8. The petition is disposed of in above terms. Pending miscellaneous application(s), if any, also stand disposed of accordingly. (Ajay Mohan Goel) Judge September 15, 2025 (Shivank Thakur)