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The Supreme Court on Thursday quashed the Allahabad High Court order allowing the criminal trial of the directors of Toyota Motor on a complaint of a buyer that the airbags of the Fortuner SUV was defective which caused his driver’s death and injury to him.
Toyota offered to pay Rs 15 lakh to the family of the driver who died and Rs 10 lakh to the owner of the vehicle. Disposing of the appeal, the bench headed by Chief Justice H L Dattu stated that this order would not be a precedent to be cited in other cases.
Gautam Sharma, the vehicle owner, filed a complaint against all the directors of the company, without the company being named, for cheating, forgery and criminal conspiracy.
The non-deployment of the airbags had allegedly led to the death of his driver and injuries to him in the accident in 2012. Since there was no direct collision, the airbags did not inflate, it is said.
The four directors moved the high court for quashing the complaint as they were not directly responsible for the accident, but it refused to do so as the trial court had already taken cognizance of the complaint.
The directors — C Kirloskar, Vikram S Kirloskar, Shekar Vishwanathan and Sandeep Singh — then moved the Supreme Court.
When the appeal was mentioned before the Chief Justice on Wednesday, the bench had asked the company to arrive at a settlement with the affected parties. Senior counsel F S Nariman had agreed to do so. The offer to pay the compensation was made following this assurance.
The court had also observed on Wednesday that the directors could not be vicariously made liable in a criminal complaint unless their specific role is evident. The principle of vicarious liability is found only in the law of torts.
There have been quite a few casualties related to Toyota cars in the capital this year.
On May 7, a Toyota Etios car caught fire in Mangolpuri (outer Delhi) killing the driver Amit Moga. Initial reports showed that the vehicle was properly maintained and serviced.
Last year, Moveability Management Services CEO Vikram Yadav’s Toyota Corolla Altis swent up in flames after being parked for two days.
“The manufacturer and the insurance agencies did not find any proof of the car being tampered with. Toyota did offer to repair the car but declined to give any written assurance that such an incident would not happen again,” said Yadav.
The car was on-road for six to seven years, after which the incident occurred but it had been regularly serviced first at company dealerships then at petrol pumps offering such facilities.
Moga had bought the car from Galaxy Toyota in Moti Nagar, in March 2012 and had driven only 11,941 km in it. The head of the dealer’s service team Ashwini Upadhaya has confirmed that the diesel car was maintained as per schedule, and the manufacturer will be informed about the incident.
Moga’s postmortem had ruled out foul play and the police are investigating whether the fire started from a short circuit or a defect in the engine. Preliminary reports have revealed that the Etios was nudging another car shortly before bursting into flames. This lends credence to the contention that the fire was sparked by a short circuit.
