ORDER

This Civil Revision Petition is filed seeking a direction to the MAC Tribunal/Sub-Ordinate Judge, Tindivanam, to take on file M.A.C.T.O.P.SR.No.228 of 2023 filed by the petitioner and proceed in accordance with law.

2. M.A.C.T.O.P.SR.No.228 of 2023 is filed under Section 166 (1)

of the Motor Vehicles Acts, seeking compensation in respect of death of Krishnaveno due to the motor accident that had occurred on 18.01.2021. However, the same is returned with an endorsement that, as per the new amendment Motor Vehicles Act in Section 166 (3), the claim petition is barred by limitation.

3. Learned counsel for the petitioners/claimants submitted that in a similar case, the High Court of Kerala has passed an order in Sathy & Ors vs. Dileep, reported in 2022 (2) TN MAC 1 (Ker.), O.P.(MAC).No.51 of 2022, wherein, direction was given to approach the Tribunal concerned to admit M.C.O.P., and proceed with the case. Para Nos.7 to 10 of the said judgment reads as follows:

“7. It is a matter of record that when the old Motor Vehicles Act 1939 was substituted and repealed by Act of 1988, the provision of limiting the right to file claim petition was six months. The aforementioned period of six months was omitted by way of amendment in the year 1994. Thus, the affected parties had a right to file claim petition in a case of injury or death at any point of time untrammeled by the objection of limitation. Legislature in the wisdom on due deliberation have reintroduced the O.P.(MAC) No.51/2022 6 aforementioned erstwhile provisions of sub~section (3) of Section 166 limiting the right to entertain the claim petition before the concerned court within a period of six months from the date of the accident. The accident in this case, as noticed above, had occurred on 23.5.2019. The claim petition was filed on 23.4.2022. By that time the new amendment had already come into force by Act 32 of 2019 effective from 1.4.2022 resulting into the impugned order. The same reads as under :

”This application is filed under Section 166(1) of MV Act, 1988. The date of accident is 23.5.2019. As per Motor Vehicle (Amendment) Act, 2019, which came into force with effect from 1.4.2022, the application to be filed within six months of the occurrence of the accident (vide Section 166(3) of the M.V.Act, 1988). The present application filed on 23.4.2022 is barred by limitation. In the result, this application is rejected as time barred.”

8. It is settled law that in case there is no provision protecting the rights of a litigant viz by causing amendment which inexplicably takes away exceptional rights, then the provisions of Section 6 of General Clauses Act, 1897 would come into play. Similar situation had occurred when the amendment was caused in the old Act of 1939 by introducing Act of 1988 wherein in a case of no fault liability the maximum compensation of MACT award was Rs.15,000/~. The High Court while entertaining the appeal by O.P.(MAC) No.51/2022 7 taking aid of the amended provisions of Section 140 introduced by way of 1988 amendments gave the benefit of Rs.50,000/~. The aforementioned objection was assailed before the Supreme Court in a matter reported in State of Punjab and others v. Bhajan Kaur and others [2008 (3) KHC 823]. After deliberation on the issue, it was held that when there is no introduction or omisision of the provisions of the Act, there is no intention of the legislature to have its prospective or retro~active applicability and in such circumstances, the amendment caused in the new Act would have a prospective effect. It would be expedient to extract paragraphs 13, 16 and 17 of the above judgment :

”13. No reason has been assigned as to why the 1988 Act should be held to be retrospective in character. The rights and liabilities of the parties are determined when cause of action for filing the claim petition arises. As indicated herein before, the liability under the Act is a statutory liability. The liability could, thus, be made retrospective only