JUDGMENT
T.S. Thakur, J.
1. Motor Accidents Claims Tribunal, Bangalore, has allowed M.V.C. No. 438 of 1996 in part and awarded a sum of Rs. 1,98,000 with interest at 6 percent per annum from the date of petition till the date of deposit towards compensation for the death of Bramarambika, wife of the appellant No. 1 and mother of the rest of the appellants who fell victim to a road accident. The claimants-appellants have sought a suitable enhancement of the amount of compensation in this appeal.
2. The deceased Bramarambika was travelling in a Tempo bearing registration No. KA 06-4961 on Bangalore-Tumkur Road. When the said Tempo reached near Boodihal Gate, a bus owned by respondent No. 1 and insured with the respondent No. 2 National Insurance Co. Ltd. came from the wrong side and dashed against the said Tempo in which the deceased was travelling. The collision so caused resulted in serious bodily injuries to the deceased who was removed to the hospital for treatment where she died. In due course, the husband and children of the deceased filed a claim petition before the Tribunal for payment of compensation. The case of the claimants as set out in the claim petition was that the accident in question had taken place entirely due to rash and negligent driving of the bus by its driver. The claim was opposed by the respondents giving rise to 3 issues which the Tribunal has in terms of the impugned judgment decided in favour of the claimants-appellants. The Tribunal has held that the accident had indeed taken place on account of the rash and negligent driving of the bus by its driver entitling the claimants to recover compensation from the respondents. On the question of payment of compensation, Tribunal has held that the claimants’ prayer for treating their claim as one made under Section 163A of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 read with Second Schedule to the said Act could not be granted having regard to the observations made by Hon’ble Supreme Court in the case of U.P. State Road Trans. Corporation v. Trilok Chandra, . The Tribunal, all the same, proceeded to determine the amount of compensation by applying the multiplier system generally followed in fault cases and after holding that income of the deceased was Rs. 1,000 per month or Rs. 12,000 per annum capitalised the said amount by applying a multiple of ’14’. The total amount awarded on account of loss of dependency thus came to Rs. 1,68,000 to which Claims Tribunal added Rs. 10,000 each towards loss of love and affection, loss to the estate and loss of consortium to take the total amount of compensation to Rs. 1,98,000. Appellants are not satisfied with the said amount and have accordingly appealed to this Court for a suitable enhancement in the same.
3. Appearing for appellants, Mr. A.K. Bhat strenuously argued that the Tribunal was in error in holding that the claim made by the appellants could not be treated as one in terms of Section 163A of the Motor Vehicles Act. He urged that although the Apex Court had in the decision referred to earlier made certain observations suggesting that ready-reckoner provided in the Second Schedule to the Act was not workable, the courts could nevertheless pickup the principles applicable from the said ready-reckoner to determine and award compensation on the basis thereof. He has urged that Section 163A of Motor Vehicles Act read with the Second Schedule, inter alia, provided that income of the deceased spouse could be taken to be 1/3rd of the income of the earning surviving spouse. He submitted that if the income of appellant No. 1 was Rs. 5,500 or so per month 1/3rd of the said amount could be taken as the income of the deceased for the purpose of payment of compensation. He submitted that in terms of the ready-reckoner, the multiple applicable in the case of any victim who was 40 years old would be ’16’ thereby meaning that the said multiple could be adopted after deducting a suitable amount towards personal expenses of the deceased from out of her income determined, by reference to the Schedule as indicated earlier.
4. There is in our opinion no merit in submissions made by the learned Counsel. The claim petition filed by the appellants was under Section 166 of the Motor Vehicles Act. It is true that in para 22 (d) of the said petition, the claimants-appellants had made a statement to the effect that the claimants-appellants are claiming compensation under Section 163A of Motor Vehicles Act in addition to the claim on the principle of fault, but the said statement was on the face of it misconceived, inasmuch as, the claimants could not maintain a claim arising out of same accident on two counts one based on no fault basis under Section 163A and the other on proof of fault under Section 166. It is only one out of the two provisions that could be invoked by the claimants for the payment of compensation. The petition, as is evident from a plain reading of the same was one under Section 166 of the 1988 Act filed with a specific allegation that the accident had occurred due to rash and negligent driving of the bus by its driver. The grievance of the appellants that the Claims Tribunal had erroneously treated their petition as one under Section 166 since the same had been filed under Section 163A therefore does not survive closer scrutiny.
5. That apart the ready-reckoner prescribed in the Second Schedule to the Act reference to which is made under Section 163A had come under severe criticism of the Apex Court in Trilok Chandra’s case, . Their Lordships had indicated the errors in the Table attached to the Schedule and observed that the same abounds in mistakes. What is important is that in the opinion of the Apex Court neither the Tribunals nor the courts could go by the ready-reckoner. The ready-reckoner was useful according to the observations made by their Lordships only as a guide. Even as regard to the selection of a multiplier, the court had held that choice in all cases did not solely depend upon the age of the deceased. For example, if deceased is a bachelor who dies at the age of 45 and his dependants are his parents, the age of the parents would also be relevant in the choice of the multiplier. Having regard to these aspects, the court had emphasised that the multiplier could in no case exceed 18 years’ purchase factor which itself was an improvement over the earlier position that the multiplier could not exceed 16. In the light of these deficiencies in the ready-reckoner and the multiplier indicated in the same, it is difficult to resort to or rely upon the ready-reckoner for awarding compensation. The argument that this Court could partly rely upon the provisions made in the Second Schedule and partly on the method adopted in the case of fault method for calculating the amount of compensation has not therefore commended itself to us. Section 163A of the Motor Vehicles Act as has been held by a Full Bench of this Court in Guruanna Vadi v. General Manager, Karnataka State Road Trans. Corporation, , be a substantive provision that confers substantive rights upon the claimants and is only prospective in its operation. The Full Bench had also held that the compensation received under Section 163A is final and not an interim compensation. That being so, reliance upon the ready-reckoner or the Schedule, selectively for the purposes of picking out of the same either the multiplicand or the multiple to determine compensation on that basis may not be permissible. Indeed if such a method is adopted, the same may lead to anomalous results. For instance, in the case of a victim who is 40 years old, the correct multiple applicable in terms of a Division Bench decision of this Court in Gulam Khader v. United India Insurance Co. Ltd., and a Full Bench decision of this Court in V.S. Gowdar v. Oriental Insurance Co. Ltd., , would be 14. If one were to go by the ready-reckoner, the multiple prescribed as per the Second Schedule would be 16. So also in the case of fault liability, the Tribunal or the court dealing with the question of determination of compensation may have to assess the income of the deceased on the basis of the evidence produced before it. In the instant case, as in many other cases, the evidence regarding actual income of the deceased may not be forthcoming in which event, the court may have to, as far as possible, assess the value of the services rendered by the deceased especially when the deceased happens to be a housewife. If on the other hand, the Schedule to Section 163A is relied upon for the purposes of determining the multiplicand in the absence of any evidence also, the income of the deceased’s spouse could be notionally taken as 1/3rd of income of her husband. The net result would be that without proof of fault, the amount of compensation payable would be higher than the amount which may be claimed by the claimants on proof of fault. Such anomalies cannot in our opinion be countenanced. If the ready-reckoner is not reliable for the mistakes that abound in the same and if the choice of multiple indicated therein itself is subject to other imponderables and considerations, we see no justification for implicitly following either the method for determination of the multiplicand or choosing the multiple by reference to the Second Schedule. Suffice it to say that the Tribunal was perfectly justified in declining the prayer made by the claimants for award of compensation in their favour on the basis of the Schedule attached to Section 163A . The finding recorded by the Tribunal to that effect is accordingly affirmed.
6. The only question that remains to be examined then is whether the amount awarded by the Tribunal deserves to be enhanced. Two factors which primarily go into the process of determination of the amount of compensation are the multiplicand and the multiple. Insofar as the multiple is concerned, there is no difficulty in choosing an appropriate one, in the light of two decisions of this Court referred to earlier. Since the deceased was around 40 years, the multiple applicable in terms of the said decisions is only 14. The difficulty lies, however, in determining the multiplicand. The deceased was admittedly a housewife. Her husband is employed in BHEL drawing a salary of about Rs. 5,500 per month. According to the deposition made by the husband, the deceased wife was not only looking after her 7 children but also taking care of the lands which he owned in the village. Apart from that oral testimony there is no other material whatsoever to substantiate that statement. In the circumstances, the best that can be said is that the deceased had a notional income of Rs. 15,000 or so per annum. The Claims Tribunal has, however, taken the income of the deceased to be around Rs. 18,000 per annum and after deducting 1/3rd from the same determined her contribution towards the family at Rs. 12,000 per annum which has been capitalised by applying the multiple of 14 to take the amount of compensation on account of loss of dependency to Rs. 1,68,000. We do not see any justification leave alone compelling reasons to strike a discordant note. Learned Tribunal has in our view correctly determined the multiplicand as also the multiple applicable. There is no room for awarding any additional compensation to the appellants on account of loss to estate, loss of love and affection and consortium either. There is no merit in this appeal which fails and is hereby dismissed but without any order as to costs.