KARACHI: After a 23-year-long legal battle, the heirs of a man, who had died in a road accident on Sharea Faisal in 2003, have secured a compensation as a civil court has directed the Ministry of Defence, the Pakistan Navy and the driver of a navy truck to pay them over Rs10.6 million.
Plaintiff Bacha Zareen, widow of deceased, had filed a lawsuit against ministry of defence, Pakistan Navy and driver of a navy truck Abdul Hameed before the Sindh High Court in 2003 under the provisions of the Fatal Accidents Act, 1855, seeking Rs12.31 million in compensation from the defendants.
However, the suit was transferred to the civil court (South), after last year’s amendments to the Sindh Civil Courts Amendment Act, by which time the case had reached the stage of final arguments.
Before the court, the plaintiff submitted that 35-year-old Noor Hameed Jan was on his way to work when he was allegedly hit by a Navy truck near Nursery Signal on Sharea Faisal on May 1, 2003. He died in the accident, leaving behind a widow and eight children.
Judgement comes after 23-year legal battle
On the other hand, the defendants denied the allegations and challenged the maintainability of the suit. They contended that the deceased himself was “negligent” as he had attempted to “hastily cross the busy road while the traffic signal was open for vehicles”, and maintained that the driver had taken all possible steps to avert the accident.
They further submitted that a departmental inquiry conducted under the applicable regulations had exonerated the driver of the charges levelled against him in an FIR registered in 2003 under Section 320 (punishment for qatl-i-khata by rash or negligent driving) of the Pakistan Penal Code.
The defendants also informed the court that PNS Qasim had paid Rs12,000 to the plaintiff towards funeral expenses on “humanitarian grounds”.
After hearing both sides, Senior Civil Judge (South) Aamir Latif Bhatti decreed the suit and directed the defendants to jointly and severally pay the plaintiff the principal compensation amount of Rs2.4 million along with a 15 per cent annual mark-up.
The court observed that after calculating the mark-up from the date the suit was instituted in 2003, the defendants would be liable to pay more than Rs10.6 million. It further ruled that, from Aug 1 onwards, the 15pc annual mark-up would continue to accrue on the principal amount of Rs2.4m until the decretal amount is fully paid or realised, and would be computed and recovered at the execution stage.
The court noted that a traffic constable, Israr Hussain, who was performing duty at the Nursery Signal at the relevant time and manually regulating traffic since the automatic signal was not functioning owing to VVIP movement, was an independent, disinterested, official eyewitness having no personal stake in the outcome of the litigation.
It added that he had deposed that he saw the deceased, along with other pedestrians, crossing the road from the Mehmoodabad side and after stepping down to proceed towards the Nursery side, a Navy truck, being driven “rashly, over-speeding, and while overtaking another vehicle, struck and knocked down the deceased”.
He also claimed in his statement that he had signalled the truck to stop, but on account of its “excessive speed the truck could not be halted in time”.
The court observed that it was established on record, including from the admissions of the driver and defence witness Muhammad Iqbal — who was travelling in the truck at the time of the accident as an escort, that the driver was, at the relevant time, driving a Pakistan Navy vehicle in the course of his official duty, as part of a Naval convoy proceeding from PNS Himalaya towards PNS Karsaz and PNS Bahadur, under the command and administrative control of defendants, ministry of defence and Pakistan Navy.
Published in Dawn, August 8th, 2026
