By the Court.—Husband and sons of the deceased, who died in accident in question, have preferred this appeal under Section 173-A of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 for enhancement of compensation. The award of the Tribunal determining compensation amount of Rs. 4,05,500/- in M.A.C. No. 935 of 2002 has been accepted by the insurance company and no appeal has been preferred by it.

2. Facts in brief giving rise to filing of the present appeal are that on 30th July, 2002 while deceased was crossing the by-pass road, she was hit by a speeding truck, bearing Registration No. MP33/H-0626, due to its rash and negligent driving at Agra, which led to her accidental death on the spot. A claim under Section 166 of the Motor Vehicles Act was raised by appellants herein against the owner of the truck and the insurance company with the averment that deceased was about 44 years of age and was running a boutique and was taking care of the claimants. It was alleged that during the last financial year, her income was assessed at Rs. 80,750/- per annum and a claim for compensation of Rs. 10 lacs was raised.

3. Claimants in support of their plea adduced oral evidence of claimant-husband Surjeet Singh PW-1 and PW-2- Arvinder Singh, an eye-witness to the incident. Documentary evidence in the form of FIR, postmortem report, technical report, charge-sheet, income tax assessment for the year 2001-2002, tax receipts, assessment order in respect of the year 2000-2001, actual tax receipts, PAN card, death certificate and cover note etc. were adduced. The owner of the vehicle denied the accident and claimed that vehicle was otherwise insured for the period 18.4.2002 to 17.4.2003 and as such, for any claim raised under Section 166 of the Act, he was indemnified by insurance policy, which was also brought on record.

4. Tribunal framed four issues in the matter i.e. (i) whether accident occurred due to rash and negligent driving of the truck resulting in death of the deceased; (ii) whether the driver had valid licence; (iii) whether at the time of accident, vehicle was insured and (iv) as to what amount claimants are entitled to receive as compensation ?

5. On the basis of evidence led before the Tribunal, it was held that accident had occurred due to rash and negligent driving of the offending vehicle, which was driven by the driver having a valid licence and the vehicle itself was insured. On these three issues, award of the Tribunal has attained finality and, therefore, no further consideration on these questions is required by this Court. The only question, which calls for adjudication in the present appeal, is as to whether the award of compensation of Rs. 4,05,500/- is adequate ? and if not, then to what extent it needs to be enhanced ?

6. Based upon documents relating to determination of deceased’s income by the Income Tax Authorities, Tribunal found that in respect of financial year 2000-2001, her income was assessed at Rs. 80,750/-. After taking into consideration the oral testimony of husband, PW-1, that he used to assist the deceased in running of boutique, Tribunal appropriated 1/4th of income towards husband’s contribution and after adjusting actual tax amount payable of Rs. 5,000/-, the yearly income of deceased was worked out at Rs. 55,000/- per annum. 1/3rd was allowed towards personal expenditure and multiplicand was thus determined as Rs. 46,000/-. It was also held that appellant Nos. 2 a nd 3 being major married sons were not dependent upon deceased. The Tribunal further held that although deceased was in the age bracket of 45-50 years but the age of sole dependent i.e. husband in the present case since was 54 years and was higher than that of deceased, as such, multiplier of 11 was applied. Consequently, the amount of compensation for the loss of income was assessed at Rs. 3,96,000/- per annum. A further sum of Rs. 5,000/- was all