1 2026:CGHC:4699 NAFR HIGH COURT OF CHHATTISGARH AT BILASPUR MAC No. 620 of 2021  The Oriental Insurance Company Ltd. Through - Divisional Manager, Near Old Bus Stand, Bilaspur, District - Bilaspur Chhattisgarh. Pin - 495001., District : Bilaspur, Chhattisgarh ... Appellant(s) versus 1. Jagotiya, Wd/o Late Shri Mansingh, Aged About 43 Years R/o - Gataura, Police Station - Masturi, District - Bilaspur Chhattisgarh, District : Bilaspur, Chhattisgarh 2. Umesh Kumar Singh, S/o Late Shri Mansingh, Aged About 25 Years R/o - Gataura, Police Station - Masturi, District - Bilaspur Chhattisgarh, District : Bilaspur, Chhattisgarh 3. Rinku, D/o Late Shri Mansingh, Aged About 28 Years R/o - Gataura, Police Station - Masturi, District - Bilaspur Chhattisgarh, District : Bilaspur, Chhattisgarh 4. Yashoda, Aged About 21 Years (Wrongly Shown As 15 Yrs.), D/o- Late Shri Mansingh, R/o - Gataura, Police Station - Masturi, District - Bilaspur Chhattisgarh (Claimants), District : Bilaspur, Chhattisgarh 5. Pappu, S/o Shri Mangal, Aged About 41 Years R/o Jhagrakhand, Police Station - Jhagrakhand, District - Korea Chhattisgarh (Driver), District : Koriya (Baikunthpur), Chhattisgarh 6. Santra Prasad, S/o Dasai, Aged About 52 Years R/o- Hasdo Dafai, Police Station - Jhagrakhand, District - Korea Chhattisgarh. (Owner), District : Koriya (Baikunthpur), Chhattisgarh ... Respondent(s) Digitally signed by AJINKYA PANSARE Date: 2026.02.02 13:16:24 +0530 2 For Appellant : Mr. R.N. Pusty, Adv. along with Mr. Akash Shrivastava, Adv. For Respondents No. 1 to 4 : Ms. Bhagwati Kashyap, Adv. along with Ms. Bhavna Chandravanshi, Adv. For Respondents No. 5 & 6 : Mr. Gajendra Prasad Sahu, Adv. on behalf of Mr. Shashank Thakur, Adv. Hon’ble Shri Justice Rakesh Mohan Pandey Judgment On Board 28.1.2026 1) The appellant–Insurance Company has preferred this appeal under Section 173 of Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 calling in question legality, validity and correctness of the impugned award passed by learned Second Additional Motor Accident Claims Tribunal, Bilaspur (C.G.) in Claim Case No. 288/2019 dated 22.2.2020, by which liability to pay a total compensation of Rs. 84,65,569/- has been fastened upon the Insurance Company. 2) Facts of the present case are that on 18.1.2019, Mansingh was going to Village Paradol and he stopped near Paradol Tiraha to attend the call of nature. At the same time, offending vehicle – Tractor bearing registration No. CG-16-A-0556 being driven in rash and negligent manner, dashed Mansingh. In the accident, he sustained grievous injuries and died. Claimants, who are the widow and children of deceased moved claim application and pleaded that at the time of accident, age of deceased was 44 years and he was earning Rs. 60,490/- per month working on the post of Driller at Rajnagar Colliery, SECL. Driver and owner of Tractor remained ex-parte before learned Tribunal whereas 3 Insurance Company filed reply and took a plea that claimants are not dependent on the income of deceased and driver of offending vehicle – Tractor did not possess valid and effective driving license on the date of accident. Learned Tribunal framed issues ; parties led evidence and thereafter award impugned was passed. 3) An application (I.A. No. 1/2023) has been moved under Order 41 Rule 27 of CPC for taking additional evidence on record. By way of this application, Insurance Company has placed on record a judgment passed by learned Civil Judge, Junior Division, Kotma, District – Anuppur (M.P.) in Civil Suit No. 52-A/2019 dated 20.2.2020 whereby suit filed by claimants No. 2 to 4 was decreed. 4) Mr. Akash Shrivastava, counsel appearing for the Insurance Company submits that Smt. Jagotiya is not the legally wedded wife of deceased and learned Tribunal committed error of law while treating her as a dependent. He further submits that a civil suit was filed by claimants No. 2 to 4 for declaration to the effect that they are children of deceased but they failed to implead Smt. Jagotiya as party-respondent which creates doubt with regard to their relationship. He contends that learned Tribunal considered the monthly income of deceased to be Rs. 68,032/- which is inclusive of quarterly bonus, thus computation of monthly income is erroneous. He further contends that conveyance allowance and sunday wages are not part of salary but learned Tribunal treated aforesaid allowance as part of salary. He argues that income tax 4 ought to have been deducted after computing loss of dependency and future prospect. He has placed reliance on the judgments rendered by the Hon’ble Supreme Court in the matter of Sarnam Singh Versus Shriram General Insurance Company Limited and Others1 ; Hon’ble Division Bench in the matter of Hilya Bai @ Hirla Bai and Others Versus Kokila Prasad Kenwat and Others passed in MAC No. 285 of 2015 and High Court of Gujarat in the matter of Jasbhai Bhailalbhai Patel Versus Balmurbha K. Munipate Devre2 and co-ordinate Bench in the matter of Oriental Insurance Company Ltd. Versus Smt. Jasita Poonam Ekka and Others passed in MAC No. 59 of 2020. He prays to set aside the award. 5) With regard to application under Order 41 Rule 27 of CPC, Mr. Shrivastava submits that a suit was filed by claimants No. 2 to 4 seeking declaration to the effect that they are children of Lt. Mansingh wherein deliberately Smt. Jagotiya was not impleaded as party-respondent which suggests that they are not related. He further submits that this judgment passed in civil suit is necessary for just adjudication of this appeal. He further submits that application deserves to be allowed and document may be taken on record. 6) On the other hand, Ms. Bhagwati Kashyap, counsel for the claimants would oppose. She submits that amount of quarterly 1. (2023) 8 SCC 193 2. (2015) SCC OnLine Guj 2208 5 bonus was bifurcated by the learned Tribunal, which is evident from the findings recorded in para-18 of impugned award. She further submits that quarterly bonus and other allowances were taken into consideration to assess actual amount of income tax, therefore learned Tribunal treated such allowances as part of income. She contends that if some facilities are being provided by the employer whereby the entire family stands to benefit, the same must be held to be relevant for the purpose of computation of total income of the deceased. She has placed reliance on the judgments rendered by the Hon’ble Supreme Court in the matters of National Insurance Co. Ltd. Versus Indira Srivastava and Others3, National Insurance Co. Ltd. Versus Nalini and Others4, Manorma Sinha and Another Versus Divisional Manager, Oriental Insurance Co. Ltd. and Another5 and Meenakshi Versus Oriental Insurance Co. Ltd.6 She further contends that this appeal deserves to be dismissed. 7) With regard to application under Order 41 Rule 27 of CPC, Ms. Kashyap submits that award was passed way back on 22.2.2020 and prior to that date, no application was moved by the Insurance Company before learned Tribunal to demonstrate that civil suit was filed by the claimants seeking declaration. She further submits that application deserves to be rejected. 3. 2008 ACJ 614 4. 2024 ACJ 1637 5. 2025 ACJ 2500 6. 2024 ACJ 1647 6 8) Learned counsel appearing for the driver and owner of offending vehicle supports the award impugned. 9) I have heard learned counsel appearing for the respective parties, considered their rival submissions made herein above and carefully perused the documents placed on record. 10) Admittedly, the deceased was an employee of SECL and claimants pleaded his income to be Rs. 60,490/-. Learned Tribunal considered the salary slip (Ex. P/2) wherein gross salary has been mentioned Rs. 68,032/- which is inclusive of quarterly bonus Rs. 11,870/-. It is quite vivid that learned Tribunal divided the quarterly bonus in three parts and thereafter assessed the monthly income of deceased to be Rs. 60,119/-, therefore contention made by Mr. Shrivastava appears to be misconceived. 11) It would be advantageous to refer to the judgments cited by Mr. Shrivastava with regard to allowances including sunday wages. In the matter of Sarnam Singh (supra) Hon’ble Supreme Court has taken note of the finding recorded by the learned Tribunal that “The Tribunal had taken the net salary at Rs. 19,947 per month after reducing the transport allowance from the gross salary.” Although, Hon’ble Supreme Court has nowhere decided the issue as to whether transport allowance shall be part of salary or not, therefore this judgment offers no benefit to the appellant’s case. 7 12) In the matter of Hilya Bai (supra), learned Tribunal had denied adding of overtime and sunday wages while assessing the compensation holding that “as these components are not part of wages, but they are allowances, which is payable on actual working of workman in the establishment and it cannot be claimed as a matter of right”. Such finding arrived at by learned Tribunal was affirmed by Hon’ble Division Bench. 13) In the matter of Jasbhai Bhailalbhai Patel (supra), Hon’ble Division Bench of High Court of Gujarat observed that “There are certain allowances which go with the person and which are paid for the personal use and for the concerned employee and they are paid by virtue of his profession. Thus, while considering the income of the victim/ deceased employee the allowances like washing allowance, conveyance allowance are not required to be included while determining the income for the purpose of awarding future economic loss.” In the matter of Smt. Jasita Poonam Ekka (supra), co-ordinate Bench deducted washing allowance and conveyance allowance while determining the income of deceased. 14) Now, coming to the judgments rendered by Ms. Kashyap. In the matter of Meenakshi (supra), Hon’ble Supreme Court held that “perquisites/ allowances have to be added to the basic salary of the deceased before applying the rise by future prospects”. It is further held that “‘income’ includes those benefits, either in terms 8 of money or otherwise, which are taken into consideration for the purpose of payment of income tax of professional tax although some elements thereof may or may not be taxable or would have been otherwise taxable but for the exemption conferred thereupon under the statute”. It is also held that “components of house rent allowance, flexible benefit plan and company’s contribution to provident fund have to be included in the salary of the deceased while applying the component of rise in income by future prospects to determine the dependency factor”. 15) Nalini (supra) was a case wherein Insurance Company had taken a plea that allowances under the heads of transport allowance, HRA, PF loan, PF, SAF, leave encashment cannot be added to the gross income since they are personal in nature. Hon’ble Supreme Court rejected such plea and dismissed the appeal preferred by Insurance Company. 16) In the matter of Indira Srivastava (supra), Hon’ble Supreme Court while discussing the term ‘income’ held that “the value of any benefit or perquisite whether convertible into money or not obtained from a company either by a director or a person who has substantial interest in the company, and any sum paid by such company in respect of any obligation, which but for such payment would have been payable by the director or other person aforesaid, occuring or arising to a person within the State from any profession, trade or calling other than agriculture”. 9 17) It is pertinent to mention that in the judgments cited by Mr. Shrivastava, there is no specific finding to the effect that allowances including sunday wages, overtime wages and transport allowances would not come within purview of income, therefore, contention made by Mr. Shrivastava in this regard is rejected. On the contrary, in the judgments cited by Ms. Kashyap, it has been consistently held that allowances or other monetary benefits which benefited entire family members would come within purview of the income of deceased. 18) It is also argued by Mr. Shrivastava that Smt. Jagotiya is not the legally wedded wife of deceased Mansingh. In my opinion, there was no occasion for the claimants No. 2 to 4 to implead Smt. Jagotiya as party-respondent in civil suit filed for declaration as there was no dispute with regard to marital status of deceased Mansingh and Smt. Jagotiya. As the Insurance Company failed to lead evidence to prove that Smt. Jagotiya is not legally wedded wife of deceased and no issue was framed by the learned Tribunal in this regard, contention made by Mr. Shrivastava in this regard is rejected. 19) Lastly, Mr. Shrivastava submits that learned Tribunal erred in treating Rinku (claimant No. 3) as a dependent whereas she is the married daughter of the deceased and she would not come within the definition of ‘dependent’ as per the law laid down by the Apex Court in the matter of Deepshika and Another Versus National 10 Insurance Company Ltd. and Others7 wherein it is held that once a daughter is married, logical presumption is that she now has rights on her matrimonial household or his family, unless proven otherwise. 20) I am impressed with the submission made by Mr. Shrivastava hereinabove but Insurance Company failed to prove that claimant No. 3 performed marriage either prior to death or after death of Mansingh and no evidence has been led in this regard, therefore contention made by Mr. Shrivastava is turned down. 21) As a fallout and consequence of the aforesaid discussion, in my view learned Tribunal has passed a reasonable award which does not warrant any interference. Consequently, this appeal stands dismissed. No order as to cost(s). Sd/- (Rakesh Mohan Pandey) JUDGE A j i n k y a 7. 2025 SCC OnLine SC 1090