1. This civil miscellaneous appeal is filed against the order made in W.C No. 50 of 1991 on the file of the Commissioner, Workmen's Compensation, Tirunelveli. The respondent in the lower Court is the appellant herein. Poomalai, the respondent, herein, filed W.C No. 50 of 1991 claiming compensation of Rs. 62,588 for the death of her husband who died on the way towards his work place and in the course of his employment. The respondent's husband, Subbiah, was employed in the modern rice mill at Thazhaiyuthu and on 18 December, 1990, he left his house for attending his shift work in the morning and on the way, there was a communal clash and he was murdered. According to the respondent, her husband was getting a monthly wage of Rs. 1,330 and he was 49 years old.
2. The appellant filed a counter-statement contending as follows: The timing of the work in the rice mill relating to the deceased was not mentioned and the occurrence had taken place before the commencement of his work and that too, outside the work spot and the cause of death of the deceased is in relation to the employment and, therefore, the respondent is not entitled to compensation.
3. The respondent was examined as W.W 1 and W.W 2 and W.W 3, Shanmugham and Ulganathan, respectively, were also examined on the side of the respondent. The appellant examined himself as M.W 1 on his side. The evidence of W.W 1 is that the first shift is for six hours duty and the deceased husband left the house at 5.00 A.M on 18 December, 1990. The deceased did not return to the house on the same evening of 18 December, 1990, and when P.W 1 enquired from W.W 2, Shanmugham, about it, he told her about the murder of her husband. It is the admitted case of W.W 1 that she did not come and report about this to any one. W.W 2, Shanmugham, deposed that he identified the body of Subbiah and that Subbiah was wearing mill uniform. It is also admitted by the appellant that the deceased was murdered due to the rioting in the village. It is the case of the appellant that the deceased was murdered prior to his coming to the work spot. W.W 3, Ulganathan, corroborated the evidence of P.W 2. P.W 3 is the superintendent in the mills section and through him, the appellant paid a sum of Rs. 2,000 for funeral expenses of the deceased.
4. M.W 1 Sivan Arumugham, assistant in the office of the Senior Regional Manager, Civil Supplies Corporation, deposed that the rice mills belongs to the Civil Supplies Corporation and the deceased, Subbiah, was working as a helper. There is evidence of R.W.I that the deceased, Subbiah, attended to his work on 17 December, 1990 and he did not attend duty on 18 December, 1990. M.W 1 has stated that he came to know at about 10 A.M on 19 December, 1990, that a person when he was coming to modern rice mill for work died on the way. It is also admitted by M.W 1 that as per the first information report given to the police, it is stated that the said Subbiah died in a communal riot. M.W 1 denied the liability of the appellant to pay compensation, since according to him, the death was not in the course of employment. The lower Court accepted the evidence of W.W 1 and her witnesses and found that Subbiah was murdered while he was coming to the rice mill for attending the work. Therefore, the lower Court found that the said Subbiah died in the course of his employment.
5. It is seen from the evidence that if the deceased had not left the house for work on that date, he would not have been murdered in the communal riot. The lower Court found that the respondent is entitled to compensation of Rs. 62,588. Aggrieved by that order, this appeal has been filed.
6. In this appeal, learned counsel for the appellant contended that the death had not taken place out of employment or in the course of employment of the deceased employee and so the respondent is not entitled to compensation. It is also pointed out by the appellant that there is no connection between the murder and the employment. In the judgment in the case of Shrimati Bhagubai…(Original Applicant) v. The General Manager, Central Railway…(Original Opponent)* [A.I.R 1955 Bom. 105], a Division Bench of the Bombay High Court has held thus:
“It is clear that there must be a causal connection between the accident and the employment in order that it could be said that the accident arose out of the employment of the concerned workman and the cause contemplated is the proximate cause and not any remote cause.”
7. If the employee in the course of his employment has to be in a particular place and by the reason of his being in that particular place he has to face a peril and the accident is caused by reason of that peril which he has to face then a causal connection is established between the accident and the employment. The fact that the employee shares the peril with other members of the public is an irrelevant consideration. It is true that the peril which he faces must not be personal to him; the peril must be incidental to his employment and he must not by his own act add to the peril or extend the peril. But if the peril which he faces has nothing to do with his own action or his own conduct, but it is a peril which would have been faced by any other employee or any other member of the public, then if the accident arose out of such peril, a causal connection is established between the employment and accident.
8. So when a workman was stabbed on his way to work and when there was no evidence to prove that there was any motive behind the murder, it was held that the accident must be held to be one arising out of the employment.
9. Once the applicant has established that the deceased was at a particular place and he was there because he had to be there by reason of his employment and the applicant further establishes that because of the deceased was there he met with an accident, the applicant has discharged the burden which the law places upon him. The law does not place an additional burden upon the applicant to prove that the peril which the employee faced and the accident which arose due to that peril was not personal to him but was shared by all the employees or the members of the public. Once the peril is established, it is for the employer then to establish that the peril was brought about by the employee himself, that he added or extended to the peril or that the peril was not a general peril or but a peril personal to the employee.
10. In the judgment reported in the case of Dudhiben Dharamshi (Smt.) (wife of deceased Chhayan Mulji) v. New Jehangir Vakil Mills Company, Ltd. [1976 - I L.L.N 233], a Division Bench of the Gujarat High Court has held as follows:
“The expression arising out of employment' is not confined to the mere nature of the employment. It applies to employment as such to its nature, its conditions, its obligations and its incidents. If by reasons of any of those factors the workmen is brought within the zone of special danger, the injury would be one arising “out of employment.’ To put it differently, if the accident occurred on account of a risk which is an incident of an employment, the claim for compensation must succeed, unless of course, the workman has exposed himself to an added peril by his own imprudent Act.
The employee, who belonged to the second shift of the mill working at 3.30 P.M, started from his house to go to the mill on one afternoon. In order to see that the second shift started at 3.30 P.M the mill had devised a rule that the workers should be inside the mill compound five minutes before the shift commenced. The entry by particular gate had been fixed for the orderly, convenient egress and ingress for the large number of employees when one shift ended and the other started. The employee came at about 3.20 P.M at a distance of 10-15 feet away from the mill gale and when he was trying to get access to the mill he was knocked down by a cyclist causing his death. On the question, whether the doctrine of notional extension applied.
Held, that the case clearly came within what is called ‘incident of employment’ because instead of the entire route being prescribed, the entry gate and timings has been specified by the employer so that the worker could properly leave and enter from the particular gate facilitating search by the watchman at that particular time. The employer would be under a duty part to obey this rule. Therefore, clearly the workman came within the zone of employment when he carried out these incidental orders and the doctrine of notional extension, therefore, clearly applied to the case and the claimants were entitled to compensation.”
11. After hearing both sides, I am of the opinion that the decision of the Division Bench of the Bombay High Court in Shrimati Bhagubai…(Original Applicant) v. The General Manager, Central Railway…(Original Opponent)* [A.I.R 1955 Bom. 105] (vide supra), is applicable to the facts of the present case. Therefore, I hold that the deceased employee met with his death while he was going to his place of work and the death had arisen during the course of employment. Therefore, the appellant is entitled to compensation. I agree with the view taken by the lower Court and I also accept the finding regarding the quantum of compensation.—Accordingly, the judgment of the lower Court is confirmed and the appeal is dismissed. In the circumstances, there is no order as to costs.