Pitambarlal Chetandas vs Employees' State Insurance ...
2002 Latest Caselaw 297 Bom

ORDER

J.G. Chitre, J.

1. Shri S.G. Deshmukh for the appellant, Shri Mehta for the respondents.

2. Shri Deshmukh, counsel for the appellant pointed out that the learned Judge while holding that the appellant was unable to work as skilled Turner has failed to compensate him appropriately, in view of the earlier decision of Medical Appellate Board treating him to be suffering from disability to the tune of 20%. Thus this Court finds force in the submission for the reasons stated hereunder:

For deciding the compensation awardable to an employee who has been covered under Employees' State Insurance Corporation coverage, his job has to be considered and the risk point involved has to be given due weightage. While judging his disability it is necessary to find out whether after getting the medical treatment and after recovering from; the accident whether that employee would be able to work as he used to do. Another auxiliary point which needs to be considered is whether such employee would be able to get employment in view of such disabled state of health. In cases where the employee is required to lift heavy articles, is required to operate heavy machines, required to deal with objects during the course of his job, has to be given due attention. A Turner has to deal with the machines which are generally heavy lathe and has to lift heavy articles during the course of his job. Therefore, the disability which has been once treated to be 20% would not make him strong and fit as he was to shoulder obligation which he has to discharge while doing the job work. The learned Judge should have given due attention to this aspect of the matter but without doing that the learned Judge reduced the disability from 20% to 15%. This Court is unable to find any reason for reducing that 5% when the tone of the judgment indicating that the appellant has lost his sturdiness, fitness which he was having before the accident. Reduction of disability without informing oneself about the reality of the life is not a proper phenomena befitting to the benevolent aspect which has been covered by the said Insurance Scheme. In dealing with the cases revolving around the benevolent provisions of law approach of the Court should be broader, realistic and reasonable.

3. Thus, the appeal is hereby allowed. The disability stands restored to 20% and the compensation stands revalued appropriately to the increased tune of disability add award stands modified appropriately. The appeal stands allowed with costs.