SC orders direct bank transfer of payout in road accident cases

NEW DELHI: As an average of more than five lakh people die or get injured in road accidents every year and corresponding number of compensation claims get filed before tribunals, Supreme Court has ordered cutting down of delay in payment of recompense money to the kin or injured through direct bank transfer (DBT) method.

In general, insurance companies, where the compensation amount claimed by the kin or injured is not disputed, deposit the money before (MACT), which delays the amount reaching the relatives of the dead or the injured as in many cases they remain unaware of such deposits made by the insurer. Enhancing the compensation payable from Rs 12 lakh, determined by HC, to Rs 36.8 lakh in a 2014 accident claim case, a bench of J K Maheshwari and Rajesh Bindal said “a direction can always be issued to transfer the amount into the bank account(s) of the claimant(s) with intimation to the tribunal.”

SC said MACTs can ask the claimants at the initial stage to furnish their bank accounts and direct the insurer to directly transfer the undisputed amount to their accounts. It said that the same DBT method can be adopted by the insurers when the tribunal makes the final award on the claims. The bench passed this order considering the large number of deaths and injuries caused by road accidents in the last five years. For the year 2018, road accident deaths were 1.5 lakh, and 4.6 lakh were injured; 2019 — 1.5 lakh deaths and 4.4 lakh injuries; 2020 — 1.3 lakh deaths and 3.4 injuries; 2021 — 1.5 lakh deaths and 3.8 lakh injuries; 2022 – 1.6 lakh deaths and 4.4 lakh injuries. Mentioning that India has done wonders in popularising digital payments, the bench said the courts and insurance companies can adopt the same for direct transfer of money to claimants instead of making them wait for months to get compensation.

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