JUDGMENT :

Dhiraj Singh Thakur, J.

The present appeal has been filed in terms of Section 173 of the Motor Vehicles Act against the judgment and award passed by the Motor Accident Claims Tribunal, Srinagar (for short, ‘Tribunal’) dated 31/10/2018.

2. Briefly stated the material facts are as under:

3. A claim petition came to be filed by the respondents No. 2 and 3 before the Tribunal, claiming compensation on account of death of one Aabid Bashir Wani, the son of the respondents on account of a vehicular accident caused due to the alleged rash and negligent driving of the driver of the offending vehicle (Tipper) bearing registration No. JK16/4098 on 11.12.2013. Incidentally, the driver of the offending vehicle is also the owner of the offending vehicle.

4. In response to the claim petition, defences were taken by the owner-cum-driver of the offending vehicle as also the insurance company-appellant herein. While the owner-cum-driver of the offending vehicle denied any rash and negligent driving as was alleged against him, the insurance company claimed violation of the policy conditions as also the statutory provisions of the Motor Vehicles Act.

5. The stand of the insurance company before the Tribunal was that the owner-cum-driver of the offending vehicle was plying the vehicle in question without a valid driving licence and without any route permit issued from the registering authority. Insofar as the driving licence is concerned, it was stated, that the driver of the offending vehicle only possessed a licence to ply a light motor vehicle and not a heavy goods vehicle in the shape of a Tipper. In regard to the route permit, it was stated that on the date of the accident, the vehicle was not at all registered and was being plied without a route permit.

6. Based upon the pleadings, the Tribunal inter alia framed two issues in which issue No. 2 was with regard to whether the vehicle was being driven without a valid effective driving licence and other vehicular documents like Registration Certificate/Route Permit etc. and whether the owner-cum-driver had committed any breach of the conditions of the insurance policy.

7. Evidence was led by the parties and the Tribunal finally allowed the claim petition, granting compensation to the tune of Rs. 6,61,700/- along with simple interest @ 6.5% per annum from the date of the claim petition till realization in favour of the petitioners and against the insurance company.

8. On the issue of the validity of the driving licence, the Tribunal held that the driver of the offending vehicle was possessed of a valid driving licence on the date of the accident, which was issued on 14.8.2004 by the licencing authority at the Motor Vehicles Department, Jammu and was valid uptill 14.1.2017. The Tribunal appears to have placed reliance upon the testimony of the Administrative officer, who was produced by the Insurance company and the verification report submitted by him and held, based upon the verification report, that the driver was authorized to drive a heavy goods vehicle. Insofar as the route permit of the vehicle is concerned, the Tribunal held, based upon the testimony of a witness from the office of the ARTO Ganderbal, that even when the route permit of the offending vehicle was issued on 21.1.2014 by the office of the RTO, yet retrospective effect was given to the said certificate by imposing a fine of Rs. 2,000/- and thus, held insurance company liable.

9. In the present appeal, the appellant-insurance company is aggrieved of the judgment and award on the aforementioned two issues. It was urged by the learned counsel for the appellant that the Tribunal had totally misapplied itself to the facts, the evidence on record and the law on the subject while returning a finding on the two issues referred to hereinabove. Insofar as the driving licence is concerned, it was urged that although the driving licence was issued, as far back as on 2004 and was valid upto 2017, the endorsement for plying a heavy