Railways Liable To Pay Compensation For Late Arrival Of Trains If Delay Is Not Explained Or Justifiable: Supreme Court

The Supreme Court, on Monday, held that until and unless the railways provide evidence and explain the late arrival of a train to establish and prove that delay occurred because of the reasons beyond their control, they would be liable to pay compensation for such delay.

"Therefore, unless and until the evidence is laid explaining the delay and it is established and proved that delay occurred which was beyond their control and/or even there was some justification for delay, the railway is liable to pay the compensation for delay and late arrival of trains."

With this view the Court, upheld the order passed by the National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission, New Delhi whereby it had confirmed the original order passed by the  District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum, Alwar allowing the complaint filed by the respondent in the present matter and directing the Northern Western Railway to pay Rs. 15,000/- for taxi expenses, Rs.10,000/- towards booking expenses along with Rs. 5,000/- each towards mental agony and litigation expenses.

A Bench of Justice MR Shah and Justice Aniruddha Bose was hearing a  special leave petition preferred by the Northern Western Railway who was aggrieved by such order. 

It was the case of the respondent that since there was a delay in the arrival of the Ajmer Jammu Express Train by four hours, the connecting flight booked by him from Jammu to Srinagar, which was to take off at 12:00 noon was missed. This forced him to travel to Srinagar by taxi and resultantly he suffered loss of Rs. 9,000/- as air fare  and was required to pay Rs.15,000/- towards taxi hire charges. The respondent also suffered a loss of Rs. 10,000/- on account of booking of boat in Dal Lake.

The District Forum thus passed an order in favour of the respondent which came to be confirmed by the State Commission in an appeal and thereafter by the National Commission by the impugned judgment and order passed in the revision petition. 

Additional Solicitor General  Aishwarya Bhati submitted that late running of train could not be said to be deficiency in service on the part of the railways.

She further relied on Rule 114 and Rule 115 of the Indian Railway Conference Association Coaching Tariff No. 26 Part-I (Volume-I), which stated that there shall not be any liability of the railways to pay compensation for late running of train. It was added that there may be number of reasons for delay and late running of train. 

The Bench noted that no evidence at all was led by the railways explaining the delay and/or late arrival of train at Jammu.

"The railways were required to lead the evidence and explain the late arrival of train to establish and prove that delay occurred because of the reasons beyond their control. At least the railways were required to explain the delay which the railways failed. It cannot be disputed that every passenger's time is precious and they might have booked the tickets for further journey, like in the present case from Jammu to Srinagar and thereafter further journey."

Therefore, in the facts and circumstances of the case and in the absence of any evidence led to explain the delay, the District Forum, the State Commission and the National Commission were held to have rightly observed that there was deficiency in service on part of railways for which they were liable to pay the compensation to the passenger.

"These are the days of competition and accountability. If the public transportation has to survive and compete with private players, they have to improve the system and their working culture. Citizen/passenger cannot be at the the mercy of the authorities/administration. Somebody has to accept the responsibility", the Bench remarked.

The Court thus opined that no interference was called for, in exercise of powers under Article 136 of the Constitution of India and went on to dismiss the SLP.

Cause Title: Northern Western Railway and Another v. Sanjay Shukla

Coram : Justices MR Shah and Aniruddha Bose

Citation : LL 2021 SC 427

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