The main legal point established in the judgment is the competence of the insurance company to maintain an appeal to challenge the quantum of compensation under Section 163-A of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988.

Rekha Mittal, J.

1. This order will dispose of aforesaid appeals as these have emerged out of the same award dated 14.12.2011 passed by the Motor Accidents Claims Tribunal, Panipat (in short, 'the Tribunal') and identical questions of law and fact are involved for adjudication. However, for the sake of convenience, facts are taken from FAO No. 1798 of 2012.

2. Two appeals (FAO Nos. 1798 and 1799 of 2012) have been filed by the Reliance General Insurance Company Limited (hereinafter to be referred as 'the Insurance Company') and other two (FAO Nos. 4829 and 4830 of 2012) have been filed by the claimants seeking enhancement of compensation.

3. Counsel for the insurance company has assailed the award on the sole ground that in a petition filed under Section 163-A of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 (in short, 'the Act'), the Tribunal has allowed deduction to the extent of 1/4th in place of 1/3rd as provided in the structured formula under Second Schedule, appended to Section 163-A of the Act.

4. Counsel for the claimants, on the contrary, has submitted that the insurance company is not entitled to challenge the award qua quantum of compensation, therefore, plea of the insurance company with regard to deduction cannot be entertained much less accepted. In support of his contention, he has relied upon judgment of Hon'ble the Supreme Court of India National Insurance Company Limited, Chandigarh vs. Nicolletta Rohtagi and others, 2002 (4) RCR (Civil) 464, wherein the Apex Court has held that the consistent view of this Court had been that the insurer has no right to file an appeal to challenge the quantum of compensation or finding of the Tribunal as regards the negligence or contributory negligence of offending vehicle. Further argued that as the matter with regard to competence of the insurance company to file an appeal qua quantum of compensation is pending consideration before a larger bench in view of reference made in United India Insurance Company Limited v. Shilla Datta and others, 2012 (1) RCR (Civil) 582, the law existing at present is to be applied in the present scenario. For this purpose, he has relied upon judgment of the Apex Court Manager, National Insurance Company Limited v. Saju P Paul and another, 2013 (1) RCR (Civil) 869.

5. To substantiate plea of the claimants for enhancement of compensation, counsel has submitted that the claimants are entitled to compensation under conventional heads in the light of judgments of Hon'ble the Supreme Court of India Rajesh and others vs. Rajbir Singh and others, 2013 (3) RCR (Civil) 170 and Vimal Kanwar and others v. Kishore Dan and others, 2013 (2) RCR (Civil) 945. In addition, it is argued that this Court in Oriental Insurance Company Limited v. Gurdev Singh and others, 2013 (2) RCR (Civil) 611 has held that decision of Hon'ble the Supreme Court in Sarla Verma vs. Delhi Transport Corporation, 2009 (3) R.C.R. (Civil) 77 and Raj Kumar v. Ajay Kumar, 2011 (2) R.C.R. (Civil) 101 can suitably be applied even in cases falling under Section 163-A of the Act and the Second Schedule of the Act is not a watertight compartment. Consequently, it would be appropriate to hold that in so far as the limits of conventional heads in the Second Schedule has no co-relation with the benefit granted under Section 163-A i.e. of the need to do away with proving negligence, a deviation may be made in assessing/awarding compensation under the heads medical expenses, funeral expenses, loss of consortium/loss of estate. In this regard Courts can resort to ratio of the decisions of the Hon'ble Supreme Court in Sarla Verma (supra) and Raj Kumar (supra).

6. It has been argued that the Tribunal has not even allowed compensation qua loss of estate as per the Second Schedule.

7. Counsel for the owner/insured of the offending vehicle has challenged the findings of the Tribunal that the deceased were gratui