Supreme Court Allows Owner's Appeal in Vicarious Liability Case Due to Lack of Employer Authorization. Unauthorized Driver Taking License Test Not Acting Within Course of Employment Absolves Owner from Liability Under Tort Law.

Case Note & Summary

The dispute arose from a personal injury caused by a motor vehicle accident. The respondent, Santanuprasad Jaishankar Bhatt, was injured when a taxi owned by the appellant, Sitaram Motilal Kalal, struck him. The owner had entrusted the taxi to one A to ply it as a taxi; A drove the taxi, collected fares, met expenditure, and accounted to the owner. B was employed, either by the owner or by A on the owner's behalf, to clean the taxi. A trained B to drive and took him to obtain a driving license. During the driving test, B caused the accident while A was not present in the vehicle. The respondent sued the owner for damages on the ground of vicarious liability, asserting that A and B were acting as servants or agents of the owner at the time of the accident. The lower courts had held the owner liable, but the owner appealed to the Supreme Court. The core legal issue was whether the owner could be held vicariously liable for the negligence of B, who was not employed as a driver and was taking a license test without any express authority from the owner. The owner argued that B was not acting within the course of employment and that A had no authority to delegate the driving of the taxi to a third party for such a purpose. The respondent contended that the owner was liable because the vehicle was being used for the owner’s business and the driver A had implied authority to train and use assistants. The Court, by majority (Hidayatullah and Bachawat, JJ.), allowed the appeal and held the owner not liable. It observed that there is a presumption that a vehicle is driven on the master's business and by his authorized servant, but the presumption is rebuttable. In this case, the evidence clearly showed that B was not employed to drive the taxi, and the owner had not given A authority to permit strangers to drive or take a driving test. The Court emphasized that for the master’s liability to arise, the act must be a wrongful act authorized by the master or a wrongful and unauthorized mode of doing an act authorized by the master. If the servant at the time of the accident is not acting within the course of his employment but is doing something for himself, the master is not liable. The driver A was not present in the vehicle, and B was acting entirely beyond any scope of employment the owner might have contemplated. The Court applied the rule in Storey v. Aston, (1868-69) 4 Q.B.D. 476, and held that the owner could not be vicariously liable. The decision therefore absolved the owner of liability for the accident, and the appeal was allowed.

Headnote

Issue of Consideration

Final Decision

The Supreme Court held that the owner was not liable. The majority (Hidayatullah and Bachawat, JJ.) held that the acts of A and B were not within the scope of their employment; there was no evidence that the owner authorized B to drive or take the test, nor had given A authority to employ strangers to drive or take tests. The appeal was allowed, and the owner was absolved.

Law Points