No ticket on body not reason to deny railway accident compensation: HC

Court sets aside order of the Railway Accident Claims Tribunal (RACT), which had rejected the deceased’s family’s claim because no train ticket matching the journey during which the man fell was found on his body

Mumbai: The Bombay High Court has directed the railways to pay ₹8 lakh in compensation to the parents of a labourer who died after falling from an overcrowded local train in 2015, ruling that the absence of a ticket corresponding to his journey on his body cannot be the reason to dismiss a compensation claim.

The Bombay High Court relied on a Supreme Court decision that held that the absence of a railway ticket alone cannot negate the claim of a bona fide passenger. (HT Archive)

A single-judge bench of justice Aarti Sathe set aside a 2020 order of the Railway Accident Claims Tribunal (RACT), which had rejected the family’s claim because no train ticket matching the journey during which the man fell was found on his body. The judge said the tribunal had taken a “narrow and erroneous” view of the Railways Act and deprived the deceased’s family members of the “beneficial legislation”.

The incident occurred on the evening of September 1, 2015, when Sandeep Panda, 19, was travelling from Belapur to Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus (CSMT) on an overcrowded local train.

According to his parents, Sandeep had travelled from Kurla to Belapur by train earlier that day for work. After 8 pm, he boarded a train from Belapur to CSMT to meet a friend. He was standing near the door of the overcrowded train when he fell off between Kurla and Chunabhatti. He was rushed to Sion Hospital, where he was declared dead.

Sandeep’s parents, Bhaskar, 52, and Praffula, 48, subsequently sought compensation from the railways. However, the tribunal rejected the claim, observing that only a ticket for the Kurla-Belapur journey had been recovered from Sandeep’s body. Since a ticket for the Belapur-CSMT journey was not found on him, he could not be considered a bona fide railway passenger, it ruled.

Challenging the order in the high court, the parents argued that their son had a valid ticket for the journey during which he fell. The railways opposed their plea, calling the family’s account “concocted, frivolous and bogus”. It argued that since the family lived in Chembur, Sandeep would ordinarily have bought a ticket from Chembur station rather than Kurla to travel to Belapur. It also contended that he would have purchased a return ticket for such a journey. Since a return ticket was not found, the RACT’s decision was correct, it argued.

Rejecting the tribunal’s reasoning, justice Sathe relied on a Supreme Court decision that held that the absence of a railway ticket alone cannot negate the claim of a bona fide passenger. She also noted that Sandeep’s parents had stated in an affidavit that he held a valid ticket for the Belapur-CSMT journey. The judge rejected the railways’ argument that Sandeep’s death resulted from his own negligence because he was standing on the train’s footboard.

Justice Sathe also pointed to gaps in the railway authorities’ investigation. The jamatalashi report, which records the search and recovery of personal belongings from an individual, after the incident was not carried out, and the divisional railway manager’s report had been submitted after a delay of four years, she noted. The railways had also provided no evidence to substantiate their claims, the judge observed.