Article 226/32 read with Article 21—Right to life—Violation of— Public law remedy—Nominal interim or palliative compensation— Contention that income and multiplier method which is adopted for determination of final compensation cannot be applied while awarding palliative compensation—Whether compensation by way of public law remedy should only be a nominal palliative amount—Held: no; it may be something more.

Article 227—Revision—Maintainability of—Oil tanker driven at high speed hit a person resulting in his death—Tribunal found that driver of offending vehicle was rash and negligent and awarded compensation— Insurance company filed revision petition on the ground that order of the Tribunal is perverse as it was passed without sufficient evidence regarding income of the deceased and rash and negligent driving of the vehicle—Claimants had produced evidence about income of the deceased and it remained unshaken—Tribunal relied on evidence while calculating compensation and there is nothing to show that its findings were not based on evidence—Police in its inquiry report found that accident took place due to rash and negligent driving of the vehicle— Driver in his cross-examination admitted that deceased died because of his fault—No sufficient reason to hold finding of Tribunal regarding fault of driver as perverse or without any reasonable basis—Whether there is sufficient merit in the revision petition calling for interference in Tribunal’s order in exercise of power vested under Article 227 of the Constitution—Held: no; revision petition dismissed.

Section 45—Life insurance—Suppression of material facts—Repudiation of claim—Non-disclosure of kidney disease—Father took a life insurance policy for his son and policy continued for more than 2 years till the assured died—L.I.C. repudiated the claim for death of assured on the ground that disease of kidney was not disclosed at the time of taking the policy—Some particles of blood and protein were found in urine of assured about 5 years before his death—If at one point of time some blood particles or protein particles were found in urine, treatment is taken and disease cured, one would not carry an impression of having kidney disease at the age of 15—Medical history papers do not say that he had undergone treatment at least for one week as was required to be disclosed at the time of proposal—Assured was examined by panel doctor of L.I.C. and nothing adverse was found—It has not been proved by L.I.C. that blood particles or protein particles found in urine at any point of time resulted in kidney disease—Whether there was suppression of material facts and L.I.C. was justified in repudiating the claim—Held: no; moreover period of 2 years had expired before the death, therefore policy could not be questioned.

Motor Vehicles Act, 1988, section 173 and Kerala Motor Vehicles Rules, 1989, rule 397 (3)—Appeal—Frivolous appeals—Court-fee— Sub-rule (3) of rule 397 of Kerala Motor Vehicles Rules, 1989, postulates that fixed court-fee of Rs. 100 per appeal is payable and it is not payable on ad valorem basis as in the case of claim applications— Payment of nominal court-fee need be curbed at least to weed out frivolous and meritless appeals.

Public law liability—Comprehensive legislation—Due to lack of legislation, courts dealing with tortious claims against the State and its instrumentalities are not following uniform pattern leading to undesirable consequences and arbitrary fixation of compensation amount—Need for comprehensive legislation dealing with tortious liability of the State.