Honble Mr. Justice Muzaffar Hussain Attar, Judge

1. 2nd of September, 1999 proved to be most unfortunate day for the respondents/claimants as in the case of two sets of claim petitions the parents of the claimants lost their lives and some other claimants suffered injuries because of accident of vehicle bearing no. HP-46-0645 near Pati Nallah Barmour, (H.P.) which was stated to be negligently driven by the driver of the vehicle. The claim petitions were filed under Sections 166 and 140 of Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 (for short "Act of 1988") before the Motor Accidents claim Tribunal, Baderwah, (for short MACT).

2. In the claim petitions, it was pleaded that death was caused because of negligent driving of the driver. Learned MACT passed an award of Rs. 50,000/- under Section 140 of the Act of 1988. The award passed in the claim petition was not challenged by the appellants.

3. The appellant-insurance company took factual stand at paragraph D and E under the caption of preliminary objections filed before the learned MACT. The said paragraphs are reproduced as under:

d. That at the time of alleged accident the vehicle was over loaded as much as roof of the vehicle was full with pass