D. H. SHUKLA, J. ( 1 ) THE appellant Marakka widow of Munniswami Ramaswami filed M. A. C. Application No. 81 of 1975 before the Motor Accident Claims Tribunal Ahmedabad (Rural) at Narol under the provisions of sec. 110a of the Motor Vehicles Act 1939 to recover her claim of com- pensation totalling to Rs. 43 0 on account of the death of her son Varadhraj Munniswami aged about 28 years from the respondents. Respondent No. 1 Santosh Benefit Private Ltd. is the owner of the concerned Ambassador Car bearing No. GJI 6867 and respondent No. 2 is the Managing Director of respondent No. 1. Respondent No. 3 Bala- krishna K. Nair is the owner of United Motors a motor garage situated near Victoria Garden. ( 2 ) RESPONDENT No. 4 is the United India Fire and General Insurance Co. Ltd. being the insurer of the said Ambassador Car. ( 3 ) THE case of the appellant before the Tribunal may briefly be stated as under : the deceased Varadhraj was serving with respondent No. 3 on a salary of Rs. 250. 00 per month according to the information of the appli- cant. On 19-12-1973 the deceased was sent by respondent No. 3 to drive he said Ambassador Car and when deceased was returning from Gandhi- nagar at about 5-30 P. M. one wheel (probably meaning thereby the tyre) of the car burst and the door of the drivers side was swung open with the result that deceased was thrown out from the car. He was removed to the V. S. Hospital where he died on 21-12-1973. It is the submission of the appellant that the deceased was in no way negligent in driving the car but the accident occurred as the car was not in a working order. She therefore seeks to hold the respondents liable to pay compensation to her for the death of her son. She further submits that deceased was maintaining her and practically his entire salary was spent after her. The deceased was healthy except for minor ailments and he was a good mechanic and a driver. It is her further case that deceased used to go home in the morning and evening for taking his food but he was sleep- ing at the garage of respondent No. 3 every night. She wanted to get him married in the course of time She claimed Rs. It is her further case that deceased used to go home in the morning and evening for taking his food but he was sleep- ing at the garage of respondent No. 3 every night. She wanted to get him married in the course of time She claimed Rs. 43 0 as compensation as per the details tabulated at paragraph 11 of her claim petition. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ( 4 ) THE learned Tribunal raised issues at Exh. 19. The first issue raised by the Tribunal is as to whether the deceased met with an accident as a result of a burst of a tyre of Ambassador Car of respondent No. 1 and that he died as a result of the said accident. On this issue the Tri- bunal has given a negative finding. [ His Lordship after discussing the evidence further observed: ]. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ( 5 ) THE next question which would now arise is whether the accident occurring on account of the bursting of the tyre could be attributed to the negligence of the owner of the car. 12 To decide this question it is necessary first to refer to the documentary evidence which is on the record of the case. Mr. K. F. Dalal produced for our perusal a certified true copy of the policy of Insurance with respect to the Ambassador Car. It shows that the year of the manufacture of the car is 1962. It is evident from this evidence therefore that when the accident occurred on 19-12-1973 the car was nearly a decade old. In the light of this fact it is necessary to further consider the evidence of the Chief Accounts Officer of the Santosh Benefit Private Ltd. Jayendra Ashalal Shah whose evidence was recorded before us. The witness has stated that he has been working as the Chief Accounts Officer with the Santosh Benefit Private Ltd. for the last ten years. He has averred that the same company maintains a motor car account and he produced the original account book containing the motor car account. It appears that the car was purchased by the company on 21 on payment of Rs. He has averred that the same company maintains a motor car account and he produced the original account book containing the motor car account. It appears that the car was purchased by the company on 21 on payment of Rs. 8 500 In his cross-examination the wit- ness admitted that in 1974 the car was resold for Rs. 5 0 He further admitted that he could not say even after referring to the account of the car as to when it was last serviced. He stated that the company did not have any occasion to get it repaired. He further stated that he didnt know if the tyres of the vehicle were at any point of time changed. He also could not say as to the mileage covered by the car when it was purchased by the company and at the point of time when the accident occurred. According to him it was the Managing Director who knew about the condition of the vehicle at the time of the purchase and thereafter. The Managing Director though he is admittedly in Ahmedabad did not come forth to give further evidence on the question about the condition of the car at the time of the accident. ( 6 ) FROM the above evidence there remains no room for doubt that the company had purchased a second-hand car about ten years after its manufacture. On an average we can make a safe inference that it must have covered over a lakh of kms. There is no evidence to show as to when were the tyres changed or as to what was their condition when the accident occurred. We are constrained to observe that the respondent No. 1 namely the company has taken no pains whether to show that the condition of the car in general and of the tyres in particular was a roadworthy condition. When we are considering the liability from the point of view of the negligence of any of the opponents for its occurrence the attention would necessarily be focused on the owner of the car and of course on the driver also. When we are considering the liability from the point of view of the negligence of any of the opponents for its occurrence the attention would necessarily be focused on the owner of the car and of course on the driver also. But here we have remember a significant and an important fact that the driver of the vehicle at the time of the accident namely the deceased was not in the regular employment of the owner of the car and that his services were requisitioned only casually and specially on that day. There is no evidence that he had ever driven this car before. It is in the light of these facts that we may now refer to some relevant decisions on this point. ( 7 ) IN the case of Barkway v. South Wales Transport Co. Ltd. reported in All England Law Reports 1948 Vol. 2. 460 a similar question had arisen before Their Lordships of the Court of Appeal. In order to appre- ciate the observations made therein (which have been cited with approval in Gobald Motor Service Ltd. and Another v. R. M. K. Veluswami and Others reported in AIR 1962 Supreme Court 1 ) a few facts may be noted. The accident in question occurred at about 6-30 a. m. on Febru- ary 27 1943 when a motor omnibus belonging to the defendants and carrying 53 passengers among whom was the plaintiffs husband was passing through a village when the off-side front tyre burst the omnibus went over to the off-side of the road mounted the payment crashed into some railings and fell down on embankment killing four of the passengers including the plaintiffs husband and injuring others. Evidence was given that an impact fracture was caused by a severe blow which could happen without leaving any visible mark on the outer surface of the tyre and might not be visible even if the tyre removed from the rim and examined. It is important to bear in mind the fact that the tyre while fixed on the rim had been examined periodically by an expert fitter employed by the defendant the last examination being three days before the accident and it was the practice of the defendants to have tyres examined internally after every 25 0 miles when they had been running on fairly bad roads. The tyre in question had run about 23 545 miles and about 21 750 miles since it was last taken off for examination. Before the accident occurred the driver of the omnibus had been driving at an average speed of 32 miles an hour and was therefore guilty of a breach of statutory duty as the maximum speed for an omnibus of that tyre in the Black out (which then existed) was 20 miles an hour. He was however not driving at an excessive speed just before the accident occurred and the tyre- burst was not caused by his driving too fast. The plaintiff claimed damages from the defendants on the ground that her husbands death was caused by the negligence of the defendants or their servants. In the light of these facts it was held as under:"the fact that the omnibus left the road and fell down the embankment raised a presumption of negligence against the defendants requiring them to prove affirmati vely that they had exercised all reasonable care; to displace the presumption it was not sufficient for the defendants to show that the immediate cause of the accident was a tyre-burst since a tyre-burst per se was equally consistent with negligence or due diligence on their part; but it was necessary for the defendants to prove either that the burst itself was due to a specific cause which did not connote negligence or if they could point to no such specific cause that they had used all reasonable care in the management of their tyres (Emphasis supplied)" ( 8 ) IN the course of his judgment Bucknill J. made the following observation:"i think that the defendants in order to avoid liability must prove to the satis- faction of the court that they took all reasonable steps to ascertain that the tyre was fit for use on Feb 27 and this I think on the evidence they failed to do. It may have been fit or it may not have been fit. The mere examination of a tyre which had run 21 750 miles since Aug. 1 1942 part of which was done on bad roads. It may have been fit or it may not have been fit. The mere examination of a tyre which had run 21 750 miles since Aug. 1 1942 part of which was done on bad roads. driven by drivers who had had no instructions to report an unusual and heavy blow to the tyre and without any examination of its internal surface during the whole of that time seems to me to leave the defendants with the burden undischarged of satisfying the Court that they had taken all reasonable steps to avoid this accident". ( 9 ) THERE was a cleavage of opinion amongst the Judges who decide that matter as to whether the defendants had taken proper care about the road-worthiness of the omnibus in question but that arose on acc- ount of the facts brought on the record of the case. But so far as the abovestated observation is concerned it is of general importance and has an universal application. ( 10 ) IF we refer to the facts of the present case and examine the aforesaid observation of Bucknill J. we 6nd that the owner of the car in question has shown a miserable concern about the road-worthiness of the car. To recall the facts it was a decade old car which was purcha- sed by the company and there is no evidence whatever to show as to when was the car and particularly the tyres checked last time. The Managing Director has not cared to examined himself to show that all necessary steps were taken to maintain the car in a road-worthy condi- tion. Not only that but although the passengers of the car were named by the brother of the deceased in the letter abovereferred to none of them is examined to show as to how the accident occurred and whether it could at all be attributed to the negligence of the driver. In view of this evidence before us we are in no manner of doubt that the accident must be attributed to the negligence of the owner of the car namely respondent No. 1 and that if must be held liable for the consequences which flowed from the unfortunate accident. No liability for the negli- gence can be attributed either to the Managing Director respondent No. 2 or Balkrishna K. Nair respondent No. 3. No liability for the negli- gence can be attributed either to the Managing Director respondent No. 2 or Balkrishna K. Nair respondent No. 3. The Managing Direc- tor is not personally liable or the negligence of the limited concern of which he is the Managing Director unless such facts are proved which would make him personally responsible for it. There is no evidence to show that respondent No. 3 was under any duty to maintain the car in a road-worthy condition and he also therefore cannot be held responsible. ( 11 ) FOR the grounds above-stated we upset the finding of the Tribunal that the accident was not proved to be due to any rashness or negligence on the part of any of the opponents. ( 12 ) IN the result the appeal is allowed and the judgment and order of the Tribunal are set aside. The respondent No. 1 Santosh Benefit Private Ltd. is held liable to pay a sum of Rs. 27 500 the appellant as compensation and it is further held liable to pay interest thereon at the rate of six per cent per annum from the date of the application till payment. It is further held liable to pay the costs of the appellant and to bear its own. The respondent Nos. 2 3 and 4 are exonerated from the liability but they shall bear their own respective costs. Appeal allowed. .