A driver of a motor vehicle owes a duty of care to other road users and is liable for any negligence that causes injury or death.

Somnath Iyer, J.—On September 6. 1963. at about 5-15 p.m. at a point on the Kulur Ferry Road in Mangalore opposite to the P.W.D Stores a young boy named Padmanabha who was riding a bicycle and proceeding from the South to the North met with his death in consequence of serious in furies to his skull P.W 3 the Resident Medical Officer. Government Wenlock Hospital. Mangalore. to whom Padmanabha was taken and on whose body P.W 3 conducted the post-mortem examination on September 6, 1963. observed during the post-mortem that Padmanabha's skull had been fractured on both sides and that his spleen and liver had both been lacerated. His opinion was that Padmanabha died as a result of the skull having been crushed.

2. On November 2, 1963. four persons claiming themselves to be the legal representatives of Padmanabha made a claim before the Motor Accidents Claims Tribunal, Mangalore constituted under Section 110 of the Motor Vehicles Act, for an award that they should be paid a sum of Rs. 5,000/- as compensation by the four respondents. It was slated in that application that Padmanabha met with his death in consequence of a collision on the high-way at the point to which I have referred and that a motor vehicle which was owned by respondent 2 and driven by respondent 1 ran over Padmanabha while he was proceeding on the left side of the road and that that was how Padmanabha was killed.

Respondent 3 is an insurance company with whom respondent 2 had insured his motor vehicle against third-party risks. In reply to the notice issued by the claimants calling upon respondents 2 to pay compensation, respondent 2 asserted that he was not the owner of the motor vehicle at the time of the accident but had sold it to respondent 4. The claimants then made a claim also against respondent 4.

3. The Tribunal refused to make any award in favour of the claimants and so this appeal.

4. It should be mentioned here that among the claimants, the first claimant is Padmanabha's mother, claimants 2 and 3 are his little minor sisters and claimant 4 is his brother who was also a minor. The claim was made by these four persons against the respondents on the assumption that they are the legal representatives of Padmanabha with in the meaning of Section 110-A (b) of the Motor Vehicles Act. Although no investigation was made by the Tribunal as to who in deed were the legal representatives of the deceased Padmanabha, it is now no longer disputed before this Court that the first claimant Seethamma, the mother of Padmanabha is the only legal representative of the deceased. That is so is clear from Section 8 of the Hindu Succession Act, read with Section 17 of that Act. Section 8 incorporates the general rules of succession to the property of a male Hindu dying intestate and Section 17 provides that, that section with the modifications which Section 17 makes in regard to the provisions contained in sub-clauses (c) and (d) of Section 8, shall govern also succession to the property of a male Hindu governed by Aliyasanthana law Section 17 becomes relevant for the reason that we are informed, although there is no material on record touching that matter, that Padmanabha was a Hindu governed by the Aliyasanthana law when the Hindu Succession Act was enacted.

5. In the application which was presented by the claimants to the Tribunal, there is no allegation that there was any negligence on the part of the driver of the motor vehicle but it is more than abundantly clear that every one who contested the claim had no doubt that the action was one founded on negligence.

In Exhibit P-4, which was the notice which preceded the presentation of the claim before the Tribunal, it was asserted on behalf of the claimants that respondent 1 who drove the motor vehicle, drove it rashly and negligently on the wrong side of the road and collided against Padmanabha who was riding a bicycle, and, who was himself on the stretch of the road which was to his left.

It is obvious that the omission by