BENGALURU: Expressing displeasure over authorities “blindly” accepting the draft term sheets submitted by insurers for payment of premiums for crop insurance and compensation, which resulted in losses to the exchequer, the Karnataka High Court directed the state government to recover the losses incurred from the officials responsible.
A division bench of Justice Krishna S Dixit and Justice Vijaykumar A Patil passed the order while partly allowing the appeal filed by the Agricultural Insurance Company of India Ltd questioning the order passed by a single judge on a batch of writ petitions filed by farmers.
The court noted that the state had already settled the deficit claims of farmers and the single judge was right in saying that the state government had abdicated its duty to frame the term sheets on the basis of data already made available on record.
The court also said the functionaries of the state government blindly accepted the draft term sheets submitted by the insurers, which apparently shows a gross non-application of mind. This conduct attributable to the functionaries is culpable, to say the least. That has also resulted in loss to the exchequer since the government is made to pay what the insurer could have been made to reimburse, had the term sheets been prepared properly, it said.
Therefore, that cannot absolve officials from their liability. However, nothing can be done to the insurers whose actions have not faltered. Lapse attributable to the officials of the state government cannot be laid a the threshold of the insurer.
The officials who failed to take due care in framing the term sheets are at fault and therefore, the loss due to their negligence or recklessness should be made good by them only, the court said.