Accidents Caused By Uninsured Vehicles & Hit & Run Cases- Delhi HC Grants Centre 6 Months To Enforce Compensation Provisions

The Delhi High Court recently granted six months’ time to Centre to enforce the provisions for grant of compensation to victims of road accident caused by uninsured vehicle and in accidents caused by hit and run cases.

The bench of Chief Justice Satish Chandra Sharma and Justice Subramonium Prasad directed “…as the statute provides for a remedy for grant of compensation to the road accident victims even if the accident causing vehicle is uninsured as well as in the accidents caused by hit and run cases, Union of India is granted six months’ time to enforce the provisions which are now in the statute books.”

The Court gave this direction while dealing with the plea filed by the legal heirs of a man who died in a road accident in 2011, caused by an uninsured vehicle raising concerns in respect of accidents caused by uninsured vehicles and in hit and run cases.

Advocate Kanwal Chaudhary appeared for the petitioner.

The Petitioner had sought various amendments under the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 in order to ensure that a victim gets compensation even if the accident is caused by an uninsured vehicle and in hit and run cases.

Counsel for the petitioner stated that the statute provides for compensation to the road accident victims even if the accident causing vehicle is uninsured, however, the Government has yet not framed any rules in this respect.

The Court observed that the Counsel for the Union of India was fair enough in stating that that amendment has come into force with effect from April 2022 and, therefore, some breathing time be granted to the Union of India to ensure implementation of Sections 145-165 of the Motor Vehicles (32nd Amendment) Act, 2019 throughout the country.

Thus the Court granted six months’ time.

Cause Title- Rita Sehgal & Ors. v. Union of India & Ors.

Click here to read/download Order