FAO/6/2021 on 6 November 2026

1. Whether the petitioner received injuries on account of rash and negligent driving of offending vehicle i.e. motorcycle bearing No.HP-17A-3414 by respondent No.2 at place

Vishwa Karma Chowk, Paonta Sahib, on 26.07.2012 at about 4:25 p.m., as alleged?...OPP

2. If issue No.1 is proved in affirmative, to what amount of compensation the petitioner is entitled to and from whom?...OPP

3. Whether the petition is not maintainable in the present form?...OPR-1

4. Whether the petitioner has not approached the court with clean hands and has suppressed the truth, as alleged?...OPR-1

5. Whether the accident took place due to rash and negligent driving of the scooter by the petitioner, as alleged?...OPR-3

6. Relief.

7. The parties led oral and documentary evidence in support of their respective claims. The petitioner examined his mother Smt. Sushila Devi as PW-1, who tendered in evidence her affidavit Ext.PW-1/A, copy of FIR Ext.PW-1/B, MLC Ext.PW- 1/C and medical bill Ext.P1. Respondent No.3 appeared as RW- 1 and tendered his affidavit Ext.RW-1/A and screening report Ext.RW-1/B. RW-2 Sh. Dinesh Tomar, Advocate and RW-3 Sh. Arun Grover, Advocate were examined with regard to affidavits concerning the alleged sale and purchase of the motorcycle. Respondent No.1 stepped into the witness box as RW-4 and tendered his affidavit Ext.RW-4/A.

8. The learned MACT held that the accident occurred due to the rash and negligent driving of motorcycle No.HP-17A- 3414 by respondent No.2. Taking into consideration the medical bill and injuries, the learned MACT awarded a total compensation of ₹20,369/- under various heads, along with interest @ 9% per annum from the date of filing of the petition till realization. On the question of liability, the learned MACT held that as per the screening report of the registering authority, respondent No.1 continued to be the registered owner of the motorcycle. Relying upon the binding decisions of the Hon'ble Supreme Court in Naveen Kumar v. Vijay Kumar and others, (2018) 3 SCC 1 and Prakash Chand Daga v. Saveta Sharma and others, (2019) 2 SCC 747, the learned MACT fastened the liability to satisfy the award upon respondent No.1. Issues No.1 and No.2 were answered in the affirmative/partly affirmative and issues No.3 to No.5 were answered in the negative.

9. Feeling aggrieved by the award passed by the learned MACT, respondent No.1 has preferred the instant appeal. It has been asserted in the grounds of appeal that the learned MACT erred in fastening liability upon the appellant when he had already sold motorcycle bearing No.HP-17A-3414 to respondent

No.3 on 03.09.2008 vide affidavit Ext.RW-3/A and delivered its possession. It was further asserted that respondent No.3 had subsequently transferred the vehicle to one Palden vide document Ext.RW-2/A, which was duly proved by RW-2 and RW-3. Relying upon the judgment of the Hon'ble Supreme Court in HDFC Bank Ltd. v. Reshma and others, (2015) 3 SCC 679, the appellant contended that the registered owner cannot be held liable if the vehicle was not in his possession and control. Challenge was also laid to the compensation awarded under the heads of medical expenses, pain and suffering and special diet, as well as the award of interest @ 9% per annum.

10. I have heard learned counsel for the parties and have gone through the record of the learned MACT with care.

11. Learned counsel for the appellant submitted that the learned MACT fell into error in fastening liability upon the appellant. The appellant had parted with the possession and ownership of the vehicle as far back as 03.09.2008 through an affidavit duly proved on record by the attesting Advocate. The vehicle was in the effective control of respondent No.3 and subsequent purchasers. Under the principles of possession and control recognized in Reshma (supra), the appellant could not be mulcted with liability. He further argued that the compensation awarded by the learned MACT is on the higher side and the interest awarded @ 9% per annum is excessive.

12. On the other hand, learned counsel for respondent No.1-claimant supported the award and contended that the claimant is an innocent third party who suffered injuries due to the rash and negligent driving of the offending motorcycle. The vehicle was unregistered in the name of any other person, and in the official records of the registering authority, the appellant continued to be the registered owner. Compliance under Section 50 of the Motor Vehicles Act was never made, and in view of the settled law, the registered owner remains liable to third parties. Learned counsel for respondent No.3 submitted that respondent No.3 had no concern with the vehicle and that the learned MACT rightly fastened the liability on the registered owner.

13. The first aspect that arises for consideration is whether the accident occurred on account of the rash and negligent driving of motorcycle No.HP-17A-3414 by respondent No.2. Smt. Sushila Devi, mother of the petitioner, appeared in the witness box as PW-1 and clearly deposed that while she was travelling with her husband and minor son on scooter No.HR-

02G-0162, the offending motorcycle driven by respondent No.2 at a high speed collided with their scooter near Vishwa Karma Chowk. The prompt lodging of FIR Ext.PW-1/B by an independent shopkeeper, Naresh Kumar, who witnessed the accident, corroborates her version in all material particulars. The driver of the offending motorcycle, respondent No.2, chose not to step into the witness box to contradict the testimony of PW-1 or to offer his version of the occurrence. In proceedings under Section 166 of the Act, the standard of proof is preponderance of probabilities. An adverse inference was rightly drawn against respondent No.2 for failing to enter the witness box. The vague suggestion that the father of the petitioner was disabled prior to the accident or drove the scooter negligently remained wholly unsubstantiated. Therefore, the finding of the learned MACT holding respondent No.2 guilty of rash and negligent driving is based on proper appreciation of evidence and calls for no interference.

14. The primary contention urged on behalf of the appellant is that having transferred the motorcycle to respondent No.3 on 03.09.2008 by way of an affidavit, he ceased to be in possession or control of the vehicle, and as such, could not be held liable as an owner. This submission cannot be accepted in view of the statutory scheme of the Act and the authoritative pronouncements of the Hon'ble Supreme Court and this Court.

15. Section 2(30) of the Act defines an 'owner' as follows: "2(30) 'owner' means a person in whose name a motor vehicle stands registered, and where such person is a minor, the guardian of such minor, and in relation to a motor vehicle which is the subject of a hire-purchase agreement, or an agreement of lease or an agreement of hypothecation, the person in possession of the vehicle under that agreement."

16. The definition of 'owner' under Section 2(30) makes it clear that for the purposes of the Act, it is the person in whose name the motor vehicle stands registered who is treated as the owner. The only exceptions carved out by the statute relate to minors and vehicles subject to hire-purchase, lease or hypothecation agreements. In the case of an ordinary transfer of a motor vehicle, Section 50 of the Act lays down a mandatory procedure. Section 50(1)(a)(i) requires the transferor to report the fact of transfer to the registering authority within fourteen days, and the transferee is likewise required to apply for transfer of registration within thirty days.

17. In the present case, the appellant admitted in his cross-examination as RW-4 that in the registration certificate, he is recorded as the owner of motorcycle No.HP-17A-3414. He admitted that he never reported the fact of the alleged sale to the registering authority and never issued any notice to respondent No.3 to have the vehicle transferred in the official records. The official screening report Ext.RW-1/B also conclusively established that the motorcycle stood registered in the name of the appellant.

18. The question as to whether a registered owner continues to remain liable to third parties despite an unregistered sale or transfer of possession was settled by a three-Judge Bench of the Hon'ble Supreme Court in Naveen Kumar v. Vijay Kumar and others, (2018) 3 SCC 1, wherein it was observed: "13. The consistent thread of reasoning which emerges from the above decisions is that in view of the definition of the expression 'owner' in Section 2(30), it is the person in whose name the motor vehicle stands registered who, for the purposes of the Act, would be treated as the 'owner'. However, where a person is a minor, the guardian of the minor would be treated as the owner. Where a motor vehicle is subject to an agreement of hire purchase, lease or hypothecation, the person in possession of the vehicle under that agreement is treated as the owner. In a situation such as the present where the registered owner has purported to transfer the vehicle but continues to be reflected in the records of the registering authority as the owner of the vehicle, he would not stand absolved of liability. Parliament has consciously introduced the definition of the expression 'owner' in Section 2(30), making a departure from the provisions of Section 2(19) in the earlier Act of 1939. The principle underlying the provisions of Section 2(30) is that the victim of a motor accident or, in the case of a death, the legal heirs of the deceased victim should not be left in a state of uncertainty. A claimant for compensation ought not to be burdened with following a trail of successive transfers, which are not registered with the registering authority. To hold otherwise would be to defeat the salutary object and purpose of the Act. Hence, the interpretation to be placed must facilitate the fulfilment of the object of the law. In the present case, the First respondent was the 'owner' of the vehicle involved in the accident within the meaning of Section 2(30). The liability to pay compensation stands fastened upon him. Admittedly, the vehicle was uninsured. The High Court has proceeded upon a misconstruction of the judgments of this Court in Reshma and Purnya Kala Devi.

14. The submission of the Petitioner is that a failure to intimate the transfer will only result in a fine under Section 50(3) but will not invalidate the transfer of the vehicle. In Dr. TV Jose, this Court observed that there can be transfer of title by payment of consideration of delivery of the vehicle, but for the purposes of the Act, the person whose name is reflected in the records of the registering authority, is the owner. The owner within the meaning of Section 2(30) is liable to compensate. The mandate of the law must be fulfilled."

19. The same principle was reiterated by the Hon'ble Supreme Court in Prakash Chand Daga v. Saveta Sharma and others, (2019) 2 SCC 747, wherein it was held that even though under civil law there may be a transfer of ownership of the vehicle, that by itself does not absolve the person in whose name the vehicle stands in the RTO records from liability to a third party. So long as his name continues in the records of the registering authority, he remains liable.

20. This Court in Anil Kumar and Others v. Jyoti and Others, 2022 SCC OnLine HP 6441, after reviewing the statutory provisions and the judgments in Naveen Kumar and Prakash Chand Daga (supra), held that third-party claimants cannot be made to suffer and cannot be deprived of the benefits flowing from beneficial legislation by following a trail of successive unregistered transfers. It was held that the person whose name is reflected in the registration certificate continues to be the owner for the purposes of the Act and remains answerable to third parties.

21. The Hon'ble Supreme Court in Brij Bihari Gupta v. Manmet and Others, 2025 SCC OnLine SC 1650, has again reaffirmed that a private agreement or delivery of possession without reporting the transfer under Section 50 of the Act does not extinguish the liability of the registered owner. It was held that the liability to pay falls squarely on the registered owner and the claimant cannot be burdened to follow the trail of successive transfers.

22. Similarly, a Coordinate Bench of this Court in Labh Singh v. National Insurance Company Limited and others, 2026 SCC OnLine HP 5469, held that for a legal and valid transfer of a motor vehicle, the provisions of Section 50 of the Act must be complied with. In the absence of such compliance, it is the registered owner who is liable to pay compensation to third parties. The fact that possession was delivered or that the vehicle was subsequently released on an application for sapurdari to an alleged transferee does not come to the aid of the registered owner.

23. The heavy reliance placed by learned counsel for the appellant on the judgment in Reshma (supra), to contend that the registered owner cannot be held liable if he has parted with possession and control of the vehicle, is completely misplaced and proceeds upon a fundamental misreading of the statutory provisions. In Reshma (supra), the Hon'ble Supreme Court was dealing with the liability of a financier/bank where the vehicle was the subject matter of an agreement of hypothecation. Parliament has deliberately structured Section 2(30) of the Act into two distinct parts: the general definition designating the person in whose name the vehicle is registered as the owner, and specific exceptions carved out for minors as well as vehicles covered under hire-purchase, lease or hypothecation agreements, where the person in possession under that agreement is treated as the owner. The financier in Reshma (supra) fell squarely within the statutory exception governing hypothecation agreements. That principle cannot be imported into a transaction of an ordinary, unregistered sale between private individuals, which continues to be governed by the primary definition of registered owner read with the mandatory obligations under Section 50 of the Act.

24. Indeed, this precise argument was raised before and authoritatively rejected by a three-Judge Bench of the Hon'ble Apex Court in Naveen Kumar (supra), wherein it was explicitly observed that relying upon Reshma (supra) to absolve a registered owner who purports to transfer a vehicle without mutating the records of the registering authority is based on a complete misconstruction of law. An innocent third-party claimant cannot be prejudiced by private affidavits of transfer that have never been reported to the registering authority. The appellant, being the registered owner of the motorcycle in the records of the registering authority on the date of the accident, remains statutorily liable to third parties. Therefore, the learned MACT committed no error in fastening the liability upon the appellant.

25. Adverting now to the quantum of compensation, the petitioner claimed through his mother that he suffered injuries and incurred medical expenses. The petitioner produced medical bill Ext.P1 totaling ₹369/-, which was duly supported by the treatment record. The learned MACT rightly allowed a sum of ₹369/- towards medical charges. The learned MACT declined to award attendant charges, noting that MLC Ext.PW- 1/C nowhere showed that the petitioner was continuously hospitalized as claimed, which finding requires no interference. Taking into account that the injury suffered by the petitioner was simple in nature as per MLC Ext.PW-1/C, the learned MACT awarded ₹5,000/- towards special diet, which cannot be said to be excessive. Having regard to the trauma sustained by the minor petitioner in the accident, the award of ₹15,000/- towards pain and suffering is modest, fair and just. The total compensation of ₹20,369/- awarded by the learned MACT represents just and reasonable compensation within the meaning of Section 168 of the Act and does not warrant any reduction.

26. Insofar as the award of interest @ 9% per annum from the date of filing of the petition till realization is concerned, the same is in accordance with the settled principles governing compensation in motor accident claims and falls well within the sound discretion exercised by the learned MACT. No ground is made out to interfere with the rate of interest.

27. No other point was urged.

In view of the above, the present appeal fails and the same is dismissed, so also pending miscellaneous application(s), if any.

(Yogesh Jaswal),

Judge November 06, 2026 (Rajeev Raturi)