Bithika Mazumdar and Anr. v. Sagar Pal and Ors.
Background
Gautam Mazumdar died in a 2007 road accident in West Bengal when a speeding goods carriage allegedly hit him and fled the scene. His widow and minor daughter sought compensation before the Motor Accidents Claims Tribunal (MACT) in Calcutta, but the Tribunal ruled it lacked territorial jurisdiction and returned their claim petition, later dismissing their review plea too. When the family challenged this under Article 227 of the Constitution, the Calcutta High Court threw out their petition on the ground of delay, reasoning that it should have been filed within the limitation period applicable to ordinary civil revisions.
Decision Breakdown
The Supreme Court held that no limitation period is actually prescribed by law for filing an Article 227 petition, so the High Court was wrong to import and apply the limitation period meant for Section 115 CPC revisions; a delay only needs a satisfactory explanation, which the family had given, especially given the deceased was the family's sole breadwinner. The Court set aside the High Court's order and, rather than remanding the matter for more years of litigation, itself calculated and fixed the compensation directly, since both sides agreed to let the Court do so on the existing evidence. Based on the deceased's Rs. 5,000/month salary, a 1/3 deduction for personal expenses, and a multiplier of 15 for his age (40), the Court awarded Rs. 6 lakhs for loss of dependency plus Rs. 2 lakhs for loss of consortium (total Rs. 8 lakhs), with 9% annual interest (excluding a 2-year period attributable to the family's own delay) and Rs. 50,000 in costs, payable within eight weeks.
Lesson Learnt
There is no fixed limitation period for filing a petition under Article 227 of the Constitution: courts must look at whether any delay is reasonably explained, not mechanically apply a limitation period borrowed from an unrelated provision; and once liability and figures are largely undisputed, the Supreme Court can finally fix compensation itself instead of sending a nearly decade-old claim back for further rounds of litigation.