The main legal point established in the judgment is the liability of the respondents under the Electricity Act for negligence in maintaining the power supply and power lines, and the principles of res ipsa loquitur and strict liability in awarding compensation.

JUDGMENT :

1. Petitioners, through the medium of this writ petition under Article 226 of Constitution of India read with Section 103 of Constitution of State of Jammu & Kashmir, seek direction to the respondents to pay ex-gratia and compensation to the tune of Rs. 30 lacs on account of death of their son Pankaj Sudan who died due to electrocution allegedly due to negligence of the official functionaries of the State.

2. Petitioners pleaded that in the intervening night of 9th and 10th June, 2013 at 2030 hours, the son of the petitioners, namely, Pankaj Sudan was studying in his room and due to sudden high voltage of power, all the electric light points and electrical appliances of the of the house of the petitioners as well as of other neighbors in the whole village got damaged and sound like cloud blast was heard from the room of the son of the petitioners and on entering the room they saw their son was lying unconscious on the chair in front of the electric switch board in the room; that due to electric shock the son of the petitioners got fainted and was immediately taken to SDH Sunderbani where he was declared brought dead by the doctors and the postmortem report confirms his death by electric shock.

3. It has further been pleaded that sudden surge in the power had occurred due to falling of high tension conductor over the LT line feeding that area/village due to puncturing of a pin insulator; that the Executive Engineer EID Jammu has quoted that the village Thadnapani and its adjacent areas are fed through 11 KV feeders emanating from Sunderbani receiving station, that most of the poles of the said feeder are without earthing and cement bottoming and in absence of requisite cement bottoming most of the poles of said feeders/tap lines were titled resulting in reduction of requisite vertical/horizontal clearances; that there is crossing of HT and LT lines without protection of guard netting and the said facts prove the negligence of the Department, in maintaining the power supply and power lines etc., due to which the son of the petitioners has died; that the petitioners through various representations approached the respondents, SDM Sunderbani, Divisional Commissioner Jammu, the PDD Department and other authorities for payment of compensation, but neither the ex-gratia relief nor any compensation has been granted to them by the respondents; that when nothing was done, a notice dated 15.03.2017 was served to the respondents by the petitioner through counsel, but despite receipt of the said notice the needful has not been done.

4. Pursuant to notice, the respondents filed objections resisting the claim of the petitioners and seeking dismissal of the writ petitions. It is averred in the objections that the petitioners are seeking compensation in lieu of their deceased son, who died due to electrocution and it is only the trial court where after leading evidence, framing of issues and after passing through the entire test on the touch stone of facts and law, the judgment can be passed; that the Hon’ble Supreme Court of India has categorically held that in cases where compensation is being demanded, only the trial court can adjudicate the same and not the High Court in its extra ordinary jurisdiction; that the J&K Government had come up with a policy for grant of ex-gratia relief to the departmental/non-departmental persons who are killed/grievously incapacitated due to electric shock and accidents, the same is envisaged in Government Order No. 328-PDD of 2011 dated 24.11.2011, subject to the explicit condition that the accident is not attributable to them but to the lapses, attributable to the Power Department.

5. Respondents further averred that the writ petition is hit by the delay and latches as the death of the deceased Pankaj Kumar Sudan caused in 2013, however, the writ petition has been filed by the petitioners in 2017 a