Motor Accident Claims Tribunals must decide claims on merits after framing issues, not dismiss them for default.

The petitioners, parents of Maulik, aged 14, filed M.A.C.P. No. 393 of 2003 seeking compensation after Maulik fell from a school bus allegedly due to the rash and negligent driving of respondent No. 1 and died in the accident; the judgment records the accident as having occurred on 14.01.2002, while a later reference records 14.01.2003.

Issues in the claim petition were framed on 27.07.2016.

When the matter was called on 06.04.2017, the claimants’ advocate was absent, and the Tribunal dismissed the claim petition for want of prosecution.

The petitioners’ application for restoration, M.C.A. No. 48 of 2017, was dismissed on 03.11.2018, and their subsequent Civil Application No. 632 of 2018 under Order IX Rules 4 and 9 CPC was dismissed by order dated 13.10.2022.

The petitioners challenged the latter order before the High Court; the respondents objected that the order dated 03.11.2018 had not independently been challenged.

Whether a Motor Accident Claims Tribunal could dismiss a claim petition for want of prosecution after issues had been framed, instead of adjudicating the claim on merits.

Whether the High Court should set aside the orders refusing restoration and restore the original claim petition for adjudication on merits, notwithstanding the petitioners’ failure to separately challenge the earlier restoration order.

The Court considered Order IX Rules 4 and 9 of the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908, concerning restoration of proceedings dismissed for default.

It applied the principle that the Motor Vehicles Act and the Rules framed thereunder do not empower a Claims Tribunal to dispose of a claim merely for the applicant’s default without recording findings on the merits, particularly after issues have been framed, as held in Bharatbhai Narsinghbhai Chaudhary v. Malek Rafik Malek Himantbhai Malek & Ors., 2011 (2) GLR 1324.

The Court also relied on the benevolent and remedial character of the Motor Vehicles Act, requiring compensation claims to be decided substantively rather than terminated on a procedural default.

Since the claim petition had been pending since 2003 and issues had already been framed in 2016, the Tribunal had reached a stage at which the dispute was required to be adjudicated on evidence and merits.

Applying the rule in Bharatbhai, the High Court held that the absence of the claimants’ advocate on one hearing date could not justify dismissal of the substantive compensation claim for want of prosecution.

Given the death of a minor in a motor-vehicle accident and the benevolent purpose of the Motor Vehicles Act, the Court considered a merits-based adjudication more appropriate than allowing procedural defaults to defeat the claim.

It therefore exercised its writ jurisdiction to set aside both the impugned restoration order and the earlier order dismissing the restoration application.

The High Court quashed and set aside the order dated 13.10.2022 in Civil Application No. 632 of 2018 and the order dated 03.11.2018 in M.C.A. No. 48 of 2017, and restored M.A.C.P. No. 393 of 2003 to its original status.

The Tribunal was directed to hear the claim petition from the stage at which it had been dismissed for want of prosecution and decide it within six months from receipt of the writ.

If the petitioners ultimately succeed, they would not be entitled to interest for the period from 06.04.2017, the date of dismissal, until 03.08.2026, the date of the High Court’s judgment.

The parties were directed to cooperate, and the Rule was made absolute with no order as to costs.