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Apex court indicts railways for denying compensation to widow

It also indicted the railways for spending lakhs of rupees and 13 years on litigation to deny the widow and her four children compensation.

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The Supreme Court (SC) has directed Indian Railways to pay Rs2 lakh, plus Rs30,000 litigation cost, to the widow of a man who fell to death from a train 13 years ago.

It also indicted the railways for spending lakhs of rupees and 13 years on litigation to deny the widow and her four children compensation.

Quashing a judgment delivered by the Allahabad high court in 2001 refusing compensation to passenger Mohammad Hafeez’s family, SC held on Friday that even if it was assumed that he fell off the train and died due to his own negligence, compensation was payable to his family under section 124 A of the Railways Act of 1989.

The law says the railways is liable to pay compensation for all untoward acts on a running train, which include accidental fall of a passenger resulting in his/her death or injury.

Hafeez’s wife Jameela had filed an appeal in 2003 seeking scrapping of the HC judgment rejecting an order of the railway accidents claim tribunal in 1999 that the railway ministry pay her a compensation of Rs2 lakh, though she had claimed Rs11 lakh.

Hafeez was travelling by Awadh Express from Ahemdabad to Lucknow on June 23, 1997. Railway Police recovered his body from near the tracks between Managwara and Kanpur stations.

The railways said no accident was reported on that route then, but Jameela said her husband fell from a running train. Railways later claimed since Hafeez fell due to his own negligence, no compensation was due. The high court agreed, but SC refused to buy the railways’ defence.

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