Boarding wrong train no ground to deny railway accident claim: Bombay High Court

Bombay High Court. File pic

Directing railways to pay Rs 8 lakh as compensation to 54-year-old complainant Munnibai Chaube from Bhandara district in Maharashtra, the Nagpur bench of the Bombay High Court said that a person cannot be termed as unauthorised passenger for accidentally boarding a wrong train and compensation cannot be denied to his family only on that ground.

A single-judge bench of justice Anuja Prabhudessai also stated that the amount should be deposited directly in Chaube's bank account within three months.

According to a report in the Hindustan Times, Chaube's son, Vikki, met with an accident while travelling from Nagpur to Tumsar on Lokmanya Tilak Terminus-Howrah Janeshwari Express on December 12, 2012. Vikki fell off the running train near Mundikota railway station and was taken to nearby KTS Hospital, where he was declared brought dead.

In 2013, a year after his son's death, Chaube moved the railway claims tribunal at Nagpur. The tribunal accepted that the woman was dependent on the deceased and that the death had occurred in an untoward incident. It also accepted the fact that the deceased had a journey ticket for travel from Nagpur to Tumsar Road.

However, the tribunal dismissed Chaube's claim mainly on the ground that the ticket was not valid for Janeshwari Express, forcing the woman to move an appeal before the high court. The high court accepted her claim after noticing that the victim had boarded a wrong train.

"He cannot be branded as an unauthorised passenger merely because he had mistakenly boarded a wrong train," justice Prabhudessai said while reversing the tribunal order. The judge further added that it was an untoward incident, as contemplated under the Railways Act, and "the Tribunal was, therefore, not justified in rejecting the claim solely on the ground that the victim had boarded a wrong train".