Justice Anish Dayal, Delhi High Court

The Delhi High Court has held that a Motor Accident Claims Tribunal cannot draw an adverse inference against a claimant left comatose by an accident because his return for the year of the accident was not filed. It held that the family cannot be expected to collate and piece together his financial records for that year in the aftermath of such a tragedy. It called the Tribunal’s inference that he had no taxable income “completely unfair, unjust and illogical”.

Applying Rashmirekha Tripathy v. Sriram General Insurance (2026), the Court took the average of three years’ returns as the benchmark income of the self-employed claimant. It enhanced the compensation from ₹1,52,76,996 to ₹4,26,09,147. It declined compensation for loss of consortium, holding that the head is settled as payable only on death.

A Single Bench of Justice Anish Dayal observed, “The MACT thereafter proceeded to hold that the non-filing of ITR for AY 2022-2023 warranted an inference that the injured/claimant did not have any taxable income during the said assessment year. This determination is completely unfair, unjust and illogical…The family, at best, could have ensured that the accountants, who would have been in possession of the injured/claimant’s financial documents for FY 2020-21 [AY 2021-2022], duly filed his returns. It is one thing to expect the family to follow up with the accountants for filing the ITR on the basis of records, already available for the previous financial year. However, it is an entirely different matter to expect the family to collate and piece together the financial records for the financial year in which the injured/claimant had met with an accident, and thereafter file the returns”.

Senior Advocate Sanjeev Ralli appeared for the appellant and Advocate Sunanda Nimisha appeared for the respondent.

“A conjoint reading of the aforesaid judgements elucidates the settled position of law that compensation towards loss of consortium is payable in cases involving the ‘death’ of a person. Therefore, while the Court is conscious of the unfortunate circumstances of the injured/claimant and is deeply sympathetic about the fact that the accident has left the injured/claimant in a comatose state, the Court is of the opinion that it would not be appropriate to depart from the principles enunciated by the Supreme Court in this regard”, it noted further.

Bharat Ghai, then 39 and engaged in event management, was struck by a car on February 11, 2022 near BSF Camp, Chhawala, while helping his children out of his parked vehicle. He suffered severe hypoxic brain injury and has remained comatose and bedridden, with 100% permanent impairment certified as “not likely to improve”. The claim was pursued by his wife as next friend. His family includes two school-going children and an 80-year-old mother.

Through an award dated March 16, 2026, the MACT, Dwarka Courts took his income for Assessment Year 2021-22, ₹2,48,153, as the benchmark. It deducted ₹9,95,015 received under a Mediclaim policy and restricted pharmacy bills of over ₹19 lakh to ₹3 lakh for want of prescriptions.

The claimant sought enhancement, contending that AY 2021-22 coincided with the COVID-19 pandemic, which had badly hit the event management industry.

The Bench noted that the claimant had filed returns for all previous years, which were accepted in assessment orders under Section 143 of the Income Tax Act. Averaging his income for AY 2019-20 to 2021-22, it fixed the benchmark at ₹4,95,943.

Following New India Assurance v. Dolly Satish Gandhi, it set aside the Mediclaim deduction. It allowed the pharmacy bills after the claimant tabulated each invoice against the treating doctor’s advice. Relying on Pranay Sethi, Magma General and Sameem Begum, it declined loss of consortium. It upheld the rejection of Ayurvedic bills, Amazon invoices and photocopied bills.

Applying a multiplier of 15, the Court awarded:

-₹90 lakh towards future medical expenses;

-₹54 lakh each towards physiotherapy and nursing charges;

-₹35,05,140 towards attendant charges, at skilled minimum wages.

The enhanced amount of ₹2,73,32,151 is to be deposited within six weeks with 7.5% interest. ₹25 lakh is to be released within two weeks thereafter, and the balance released as a lump sum to enable the wife to repay borrowings.

Cause Title: Bharat Ghai (Through His Wife Harpreet Kaur) v. Raju Grover (Since Deceased) Through His LRs & Anr. (Neutral Citation: 2026:DHC:9958)

Appearances:

Appellant: Senior Advocate Sanjeev Ralli, with Advocates Chetanya Baweja, Ravi Kant Yadav and Nivedita Sharma.

Respondent: Advocate Sunanda Nimisha.

Click here to read/download the Judgment


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