Supreme Court restores Rs 8 lakh compensation to parents of Gujarat train-fall victim

On Friday, Justices Ujjal Bhuyan and AS Chandurkar of the Supreme Court restored the Rs 8 lakh compensation, with interest, awarded to the parents of Maheshbhai, who died from injuries after falling off a general compartment on a train traveling from Ahmedabad to Surat in September 2017. The court rejected the Gujarat High Court’s view that the absence of a recovered ticket invalidated the claim, emphasizing the victim’s father’s oath-bound testimony and the fact that Maheshbhai had been hospitalized for more than a month.

The Railways Claim Tribunal had previously classified the incident as an “untoward incident” and affirmed the victim’s status as a bona-fide passenger. The Supreme Court criticized the railway’s inability to disprove the claim, noting that witnesses had not examined the victim’s pockets and that the railway’s investigation report was delayed by seven months. It ordered the Rs 8 lakh award to be paid within thirty days, asserting that procedural lapses cannot prejudice claimants.