Two appeals under MAC Appeal No. 162/2003 and 163/2003 have come-up for hearing as analogous items in view of the fact that both the appeals have arisen from the same accident. By judgment and order dated 04.07.2003 passed in the MAC Case No. 374/1999 and MAC Case No. 375/1999 the learned Member, Motor Accident Claims Tribunal, Kamrup, Guwahati awarded amount of Rs. 4,40,000/- to each of the two claimants as compensation amount. The case involved in these two appeals may be briefly stated thus:

2. On 04.02.1999 a cultural troupe known as ‘Bhaiya Mama Group’ held a cultural show of 770th anniversary of Chowlung Shukafa held at Charidew and there from while returning by Tata Sumo vehicle bearing Registration No. DL-C-6-6853 it met with an accident at Bhergaon under Khetri P.S. as the said vehicle was hit by Omni Bus bearing Registration No. AS-01-D-6566, coming from the opposite direction. In the accident five artists including driver died on the spot. The sons of the claimants of these two appeals have also died.

3. It is not in dispute that both the aforesaid vehicles were under the insurance coverage of the National Insurance Company Ltd. which is the respondent in this appeal. The claimants alongwith others lodged separate claim petitions before the Motor Accident Claims Tribunal, Kamrup at Guwahati. As many as 7 claimant cases were lodged either by the victims or by the dependents of the deceased victims and out of the said 7 cases as many as 4 cases were settled by way of compromise whereas 3 remaining cases were taken-up for decision on contest. The said cases were MAC Case No. 137/1999, MAC Case No. 374/1999 and MAC Case No. 375/1999. All these three MAC cases were decided by a common judgment passed by the learned Tribunal on 04.07.2003, out of which there was no appeal in so far as the MAC Case No. 137/1999 is concerned. The claimants of MAC Case No. 374/1999 and MAC Case No. 375/1999 preferred two appeals, namely, MAC Appeal No. 162/2003 and MAC Appeal No. 163/2003 respectively. The MAC Appeal No. 163/2003 arose out of MAC Case No. 374/1999. In that case MAC Case No. 374/1999 was filed by one Kusum Medhi, mother of deceased Ranjit Medhi. Deceased Ranjit Medhi was 27 years of age at the time of accident and as per the claim petition he had a monthly income of Rs. 15,000/-. The age of the claimant, Kusum Medhi as on the date of deposition was 65 years and with as such she was about 57 years of age at the time the unfortunate accident had taken place.

4. Similarly, in MAC Appeal No. 162/1999, one Sanjib Das died for which his mother Sailada Das filed MAC Case No. 375/1999. He was also 36 years of age and his mother Sailada Das was 60 years of age as in the date of deposition. This shows Sailada Das was 50 years of age at the date of accident. The monthly income of Sanjib Das was shown as Rs. 15,000/- in the claim-petition. The claimants examined themselves and the records of relevant police case were also brought for consideration by the learned Tribunal. From perusal of the materials on record, it appears that there is no dispute with regard to accident and death of the victims. There is also no dispute with regard to insurance coverage of the vehicles in question which met with accident. After consideration of the materials on record, the learned Tribunal came to the finding that both the deceased, namely, Ranjit Medhi as well as Sanjib Das had monthly income of Rs. 10,000/- each and after deducting one-third of the income their dependency was ascertained at Rs. 6667/-. There upon the learned Tribunal arrived at the compensation amount as follows:

Loss of dependency Rs. 6667 x 12 x 5 = Rs. 4,40,020/-

Funeral Expenses = Rs. 10,000/-

Love and affection = Rs. 10,000/-

Loss of expectation of life = Rs. 20,000/-

Total Rs 4,40,020/-

By rounding figure the amount arose to 4,40,000/-

5. The insurance company did not dispute the compensation amount and made payment immediately @ interest