Court orders Rs 24 lakh compensation to electrocution victim

Srinagar, Nov 25: Holding that it is the duty of officials of the Power Development Department (PDD) to regularly check all electric connections, particularly vital installations, high tension wires and transformers, the High Court of Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh on Friday awarded a compensation of Rs 24 lakh to a victim who suffered permanent disability due to electrocution caused by falling of 33000 KV power transmission line.
While holding officials of the PDD responsible for being negligent in performance of their duties, the court ruled that it is their statutory duty to ensure that no mishap takes place on account of lack of proper maintenance of these installations.
The court of Justice Sanjay Dhar ruled that the authorities manning dangerous commodity like electricity have extra duty to take all measures to prevent any mishap. The bench observed that high voltage electric current passing through transmission lines invariably pass above agricultural and other cultivable and uncultivable lands.
It underscored that if the authorities of the PDD are allowed to wash off their hands from a case where some mishap has taken place due to the falling of transmission line on the fields where people are working, it will have dangerous consequences and no one would allow the transmission lines to pass over his/her fields.
“It is, thus, bounden duty of the officers/officials of the PDD to manage prevent and check the transmission lines from being falling down by installing necessary devices and keep regular check on the same, which in the instant case they have failed to do,” the bench noted and added, “Thus, negligence of the officers/officials of the PDD is writ large in the instant case.”
The court passed the observations in a plea by Mala Begum, a housewife, seeking compensation of Rs 50 lakh for the permanent disability caused to her due to electrocution. The petitioner had also sought a direction to the respondents to appoint her son on compassionate grounds and to regularise services of her husband, which the court declined to grant.