Violation of a condition in the contract of insurance does not amount to fundamental breach or contribute in a direct causal way to the accident, the insured cannot be deprived of the cover.

Mr. Justice S. Parvatha Rao, President— F.A. I.A. No. 34/1999 is an application for condoning the delay in presenting the appeal, F.A. S.R. No. 62/1999, by the opposite party in C.D. No. 159/1998 questioning the order of the Cuddapah District Forum dated 24.10.1998. It is stated in the affidavit in support of the F.A. I.A. No. 34/1999 that the copy of the order of the District Forum was received by the petitioner/ appellant on 11.11.1998 itself. Thus the last date for presenting the appeal was 11.12.1998. The appeal was presented on 13.1.1999. The reason for the delay was stated in the affidavit as follows :

“Legal opinion was sought from the Advocate, which was received by the Divisional Office only on 22.12.1998. The file was then sent to the Regional Office on 30.12.1998. It was opined to file an appeal and the case was sent to the Advocate on 9.1.1999 and the appeal is being preferred without any further delay.”

We find that there was remissness on the part of the persons concerned in not assiduously avoiding delay after the copy of the order was received on 11.11.1998. Even after the opinion was given by the Advocate, no effort was made to present the appeal without any further delay by 11.12.1998. There was total disregard of the statutory requirement that the appeal should be presented within thirty days and there was no endeavour to present the appeal by 11.12.1998. Absent, diligence and prompt action for presenting appeal within time, sufficient cause for delay to be ruled out. On the facts of the present case we find that sufficient cause is not made out for condoning the delay.

2. F.A. I.A. No. 34/1999 is therefore dismissed and consequently F.A. S.R. No. 62/ 1999 is rejected.

3. We have gone through the order of the District Forum for satisfying ourselves about its legality and regularity. The District Forum found that at the time when the accident occurred, the tractor drawing loaded trailer was being driven by one Arogya Varaprasad, who was not having any driving licence and that one S. Maqbul Basha, the driver, was present on the vehicle but he was not driving the vehicle. However, the District Forum held that that could not be a ground for the opposite party rejecting the claim of the complainant based on the insurance policy taken by him from the opposite party. In holding so, the District Forum sought to rely upon decisions of the High Court of Andhra Pradesh in The New India Assurance Company Limited v. Koppula Nagamani & Ors., (1) 1997 ALT 819=1997 (2) ALD 96, and Ankinapalli Yanadamma & Ors. v. G. Sreenivasulu Reddy & Anr., (1) 1997 ALT 259=1997 (1) ALD 643 and P. Naguru & Anr. v. S. Krishnama Raju & Anr., (4) 1996 ALT 630=1997 (1) ALD 85. All these are cases relating to claims by third parties involved in motor vehicle accidents based in tort for negligent driving of the vehicles and they arose before the Motor Accident Claims Tribunals. The principles laid in those cases were approved by the Supreme Court in Sohan Lal Passi v. P. Sesh Reddy & Ors., II (1996) ACC 617 (SC)=AIR 1996 SC 2627=(1996) 5 SCC 21. That was also a case where the third party claim raised before the Motor Accident Claims Tribunal was sought to be repudiated by the Insurance Company on the ground that the vehicle which was the cause of the accident was being driven by a person not holding a valid driving licence and therefore there was violation of condition of insurance policy and therefore it was not liable to reimburse or indemnify the insured. In the present case no third party claim in tort is involved. The complainant was the insured himself resting his claim on the contract of insurance. We had occasion to consider whether the decision of the Supreme Court in Sohan Lai Passi v. P. Sesh Reddy & Anr. (supra), would be attracted to such cases. In E. Lakshmanna v. Divisional Manager, United India Insurance Company Limited, Chittoor & Anr., 1999 ALD (Consumer) 57, we held that the decision did not govern such cases. We held as fol