U.D. Salvi, J.- Dismissal of the Motor Accident Claim Petition No. 333/1992 by judgment and award dated 11.9.2000 passed by the Ld. Motor Accident Claims Tribunal. South Goa, Margao is in issue in this appeal.

2. Undisputedly, one Abdul Mulla, husband of the appellant No. 1 Khatija Bee and father of the other appellants died in the motorcycle accident, which occurred at 5.30 p.m. on 27.7.1992 on the road near Multipurpose High School leading to Margao from Borda, and the said motorcycle of the ownership of the respondent No. 2 Pedro Cardozo was driven by his son respondent No. 1 Oswald Cardozo at the material time. Only the manner in which this accident occurred is the subject matter of the controversy in the present appeal.

3. According to the appellants, the respondent No. 1 riding a motorcycle No. GDJ-3490 hit the deceased Abdul, who was walking on the road and proceeding towards Margao, from behind in rash and negligent manner, and the deceased succumbed to the injuries sustained as a result of the said accident. On the other hand, the respondents have contended that the deceased Abdul was crossing the road in a drunken state and dashed against the motorcycle driven by the a respondent No. 1 as a result of which the respondent No. 1 sustained head injury and fracture to the left hand forefinger and the accident had occurred entirely due to the fault of the deceased vide written statement dated 12.4.1993.

4. The appellant No.1 Khatijabe examined herself and three more witnesses including the Medical Officer, who had conducted autopsy on the body of the deceased Abdul. The respondent No. 1-Oswald examined himself as well as RW 2 Navneet Arsekar, who claimed to be an eye-witness of the incident.

5. Considering the evidence of CW 4 Dr. Silvano Sapeco, the Medical Officer, who conducted the post-mortem examination of the body of the deceased, the Ld. Claims Tribunal rightly held that the deceased succumbed to the injuries sustained in the said accident. This fact has remained undisputed.

6. As regards the deceased being in the drunken state, the Ld. Claims Tribunal found no enough proof in the evidence adduced by the rival parties. What remains in question, therefore, is the manner in which the accident had taken place.

7. Acquittal of the respondent No.1 Oswald in the criminal case arising out of said accident has been pitted in the present appeal as a ground in support of the plea for dismissal of this appeal. Such specious plea deserves to be rejected only for the simple reason that while deciding the issue of negligence in a civil case, one has to examine the issue on the touchstone of preponderance of probabilities and not ask for proof of negligence beyond reasonable doubt as is done in the criminal cases. Ld. Advocate Shirodkar for the appellants in support of this thinking cited judgment of the Hon'ble Apex Court reported in 1980 (3) SCC 457. N.K.V. Brothers (P) Ltd. v. M. Karumai Ammal and others, wherein the Hon'ble Apex Court observed as under :

''The plea that the criminal case had ended in acquittal and that, therefore, the civil suit must follow the suit, was rejected and rightly. The requirement of culpable rashness under Section 304-A, IPC is more drastic than negligence sufficient under the Law of Tort to create liability."

8. The Hon'ble Apex Court further observed in N.K.V. Brothers (P) Ltd.'s case as under :

"The Accident Tribunal must take special care to see that innocent victims do not suffer and driver and owners do not escape liability merely because of some doubt here or some obscurity there. Save in plain cases, culpability must be inferred from the circumstances where it is fairly reasonable. The Court should not succumb to niceties, technicalities and mystic maybes."

It is, therefore, necessary to ascertain from the evidence the circumstances from which culpability can be reasonably inferred.

9. CW 1 Khatija-the appellant No. 1 was not an eye-witness. CW 2 Ulgappa deposed that he was a panch witnessi