Shivakumar M. v. The Managing Director, BMTC
Background
The appellant, a self-employed painter from Bangalore, was injured in a motor accident in August 2013 and suffered 81% disability in one limb. He claimed his monthly income was Rs.15,000-16,500, but having no documentary proof (being a casual, piece-rate worker with no fixed employer), the Motor Accident Claims Tribunal assessed his income at only Rs.5,500 per month, which the High Court later revised slightly upward to Rs.6,500. He appealed to the Supreme Court seeking a fairer income assessment for computing his compensation.
Decision Breakdown
The Supreme Court held that since there was no serious dispute about the appellant's age or his profession as a painter, and since casual, house-to-house workers like him genuinely have no way of producing documentary income proof, his own reasonable self-estimate of Rs.15,000 per month should have been accepted rather than an arbitrarily low figure. The Court fixed his income at Rs.15,000 per month, deducted one-third for personal expenses, and arrived at Rs.10,000 per month for computing compensation (replacing the High Court's Rs.6,500 figure), with 9% annual interest from the date of the original claim petition. It also directed the respondent to deposit the recalculated compensation within three months, failing which 18% interest would apply and the responsible officers would be personally liable.
Lesson Learnt
Courts can accept a claimant's own reasonable, undisputed estimate of income where the nature of informal, casual work makes documentary proof genuinely unavailable: compensation tribunals should not mechanically lowball income just because no payslips exist.