Delhi HC asks Centre to implement law on compensation to accident victims

The Delhi High Court has asked the Centre to ensure, within six months, the implementation of the laws pertaining to the payment of compensation to victims of hit-and-run incidents and accidents caused by uninsured vehicles.

The central government informed the court that although guidelines had not yet been established, it had revised the motor vehicle law to provide compensation in cases of accidents brought on by uninsured vehicles.

It claimed that a plan was currently in place to compensate victims of traffic accidents even if the at-fault vehicle lacked insurance and sought the court to grant it six months to make the measure nationwide.

“Resultantly, 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,” said a bench of Chief Justice Satish Chandra Sharma and Justice Subramonium Prasad in a recent order.

The legal heirs of a deceased accident victim petitioned the court, asking for compensation for themselves and other accident victims for the loss they had endured as a result of the Motor Vehicles Act’s and its norms’ non-implementation. The court granted their request.

The petition expressed grave worries about accidents brought on by uninsured cars as well as hit-and-run incidents after the victim died in a traffic accident in August 2011 that was caused by an uninsured tractor.

The petitioners demanded that the Motor Vehicles Act be put into effect as well as instructions to the authorities to provide information on accidents caused by uninsured vehicles or by a person operating the offending vehicle without a valid driver’s licence, along with the measures taken to address this threat and ensure that offenders are brought to justice.

The Motor Vehicles (32nd Revision) Act of 2019’s Sections 145 to 165 took some time to implement, according to the Center. The amendment with regard to uninsured vehicles went into effect on April 1, 2022.