The Gujarat High Court upheld a lower court judgement and ordered IA and AAI to pay a compensation of over Rs6 crore to families of those killed in the 1988 plane crash.
The Gujarat High Court today upheld a lower court judgement and ordered Indian Airlines (IA) and Airport Authority of India (AAI) to pay a compensation of over Rs6 crore to families of those killed in the 1988 plane crash.
An IA plane had crashed a few kilometres away from the Ahmedabad airport in October 1988, killing 127 out of the 129 people, including crew members on board.
The family members of 34 victims had approached the lower court demanding higher compensation claiming that the accident was caused due to negligence of IA and AAI.
The sessions court in March 2003 had ordered IA and AAI to pay compensation of over Rs6 crore to the petitioners. IA was asked to give 70%, while AAI the rest 30%.
Both the IA and AAI later moved the Gujarat High Court in 2004 challenging the lower court's order.
Today, a division bench of justices MS Shah and HN Devani, upheld the lower court order and ordered IA and AAI to pay the compensation to petitioners by December 31, 2009.
The two agencies had requested stay on the order to approach a higher court, which was denied by the division bench.
The court in its order has altered the ratio of compensation and asked IA to pay 90%, and AAI the remaining 10%.
Lawyer representing one of the petitioners, Subhash Barot, said the HC has increased the annual interest rate to 9% from 6% as ordered by the lower court.
Court has also asked the IA and AAI to bear the litigation costs of the petitioners, Barot said.
The compensation to be received by the petitioners, when put together, would amount to over Rs6 crore, he said.
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