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Synopsis

The Supreme Court on February 10, 2025, raised the compensation awarded to an engineering student to over Rs 34.56 lakh after emphasising that he could not be treated as an unskilled worker for the purpose.

A bench of Justices Sanjay Karol and Manmohan took the notional income of the claimant-appellant Deepak Singh alias Deepak Chauhan as Rs 10,000 per month to reassess compensation to be awarded to him under the Motor Vehicle Act.

The claimant-appellant filed the appeal, aggrieved by the order and judgment of the High Court of Punjab and Haryana at Chandigarh on January 9, 2020. The appeal before the high court was drawn against the judgment and order dated Motor Accident Claims Tribunal, Gurgaon passed on September 25, 2013.

On October 12, 2012, the claimant-appellant along with his friend Bhagwan Singh were riding a motorcycle, being driven by the latter, heading to Kulana, when they collided with a Scorpio, which was being driven at a fast pace, rashly and negligently, from the wrong side.

Bhagwan Singh succumbed to the injuries on the spot while the claimant-appellant suffered grievous injuries. An FIR under Sections 279, 337, 304- A and 427 of the Indian Penal Code was registered on October 13, 2012. The claimant-appellant filed the claim petition on January 7, 2013.

The MACT awarded him a sum of Rs 7,09,303 as compensation along with interest at the rate of 7.5% per annum from the date of filing of the petition till its realisation.

Feeling dissatisfied and aggrieved by the compensation awarded, the claimant-appellant appealed before the high court, which relied on a judgment of the apex court in Raj Kumar Vs Ajay Kumar (2011) and enhanced the total compensation to Rs 23,90,719 and along with the interest.

Further aggrieved, an appeal was filed before the apex court by the claimant-appellant.

The counsel for the claimant-appellant took issue with the high court’s reliance on minimum wages to calculate compensation. He placed reliance on an order of January 13, 2020, of the apex court passed in Navjot Singh Vs Harpreet Singh.

"We find force in this submission of the claimant-appellant," the bench said.

The bench noted while dealing with the claim of compensation of a similarly placed individual, i.e., a student in his twenties, the top court in Harpreet Singh took exception to equating the notional income of an engineering student to that of an unskilled worker.

"We do not think that the notional income of a student undergoing a degree course in engineering from a premier institute should be taken to be equivalent to the minimum wages admissible to an unskilled worker. Students recruited through campus interviews are at least offered a sum of Rs 20,000 per month. Even if we do not go on the said basis, the High Court could have fixed the notional income atleast at Rs 10,000 per month. Therefore, in the facts and circumstances of the case, and by exercising our power under Article 142 of the Constitution of India, we take the notional monthly income of the appellant as Rs 10,000 per month," the apex court had then said.

In the present facts, the court said, the accident took place in the year 2012. Hence, reliance could be placed on Harpreet Singh. In the attending facts, taking the notional income to be Rs 10,000 per month, the compensation to be awarded would be recomputed, it said.

Allowing the appeal, the bench said, the total amount would come to Rs 34,56,110 as also interest at the rate of 7.5% per annum from the date of filing of the claim petition before the Tribunal, but it will exclude the 642 days delay period, in preferring the appeal before this court.

Case Title: Deepak Singh alias Deepak Chauhan Vs Mukesh Kumar & Ors