Compensation for railway accidents is determined by the applicable rules at the time of the incident, with interest awarded from the date of accrual, not the date of the accident.

JUDGMENT :

Rajnish Kumar, J.

1. Heard Shri Pradeep Singh Somvanshi, learned counsel for the appellants and Ms. Harsha Yadav, learned counsel for the respondent.

2. The sole argument advanced by learned counsel for the appellants is that interest has been awarded from the date of award, whereas it should have been awarded from the date of incident as per judgement of Hon'ble Supreme Court in the case of Union of India vs. Rina Devi, Civil Appeal No. 4945 of 2018.

3. Learned counsel for the appellants relying on the judgement of the High Court of Punjab and Haryana at Chandigarh in Civil Revision No.3730 of 2019 (O&M); Anju and others versus Union of India and other connected revisions further submits that the learned Tribunal has wrongly and illegally directed to make the payment of compensation awarded by the Tribunal in installments and the total amount is liable to be released. Therefore, the impugned judgement and award is liable to be modified accordingly.

4. Per contra, learned counsel for the respondent submits that the interest has been awarded in accordance with the aforesaid judgement of Hon'ble Supreme Court in the case of Union of India vs. Rina Devi because the amount of compensation if enhanced after the incident can be awarded after calculating the interest on the old entitlement of compensation, if the same is higher on the date of award along with interest and accordingly the compensation and the interest has been awarded, therefore, there is no illegality or error in the impugned judgement and award.

5. Learned counsel for the respondent further submits that there is no ground for release of total amount of compensation and the scheme has been framed in pursuance of a judgement passed by the Delhi High Court, therefore, unless the ground is taken and the cause is shown, the appellant is not entitled for release of total amount together.

6. Having considered the submissions of learned counsel for the parties, I have perused the records.

7. The alleged untoward incident happened on 15.06.2015, in regard to which the claim petition was filed before the Railway Claims Tribunal, which has been allowed by means of impugned judgement and award dated 18.10.2019 passed in Case No.OA/II/U/995/15 by the Railway Claims Tribunal, Lucknow Bench, Lucknow. The amount of compensation of Rs.4 lakhs at the time of accident was enhanced to Rs.8 lakhs by means of the amendment in Part-I of the Schedule of the Railway Accidents and Untoward Incidents (Compensation) Rules, 1990 vide G.S.R. 1165 (E) dated 22.12.2016. The Hon'ble Supreme Court, in the case of Union of India vs. Rina Devi (supra) has concluded that the compensation will be payable as applicable on the date of the accident with interest as may be considered reasonable from time to time on the same pattern as in accident claim cases and if the amount so calculated is less than the amount prescribed as on the date of the award of the Tribunal, the claimant will be entitled for higher of the two amounts. Relevant paragraph 15.4 of the aforesaid judgement is extracted herein-below:

"15.4 Accordingly, we conclude that compensation will be payable as applicable on the date of the accident with interest as may be considered reasonable from time to time on the same pattern as in accident claim cases. If the amount so calculated is less than the amount prescribed as on the date of the award of the Tribunal, the claimant will be entitled to higher of the two amounts. This order will not affect the awards which have already become final and where limitation for challenging such awards has expired, this order will not by itself be a ground for condonation of delay."

8. In view of above, the compensation is to be calculated on the date of award considering the compensation applicable on the date of accident and interest thereon as may be considered reasonable from time to time and after calculating the compensation applicable on the date of accident with the interest thereon upto the date of