Electricity Shock Injury Compensation- High court Chandigarh

Advocate Vikram Singh
Vikram Singh & Associates, Punjab & Haryana High Court, Chandigarh. Updated October 2026.

Electric shock injury compensation is often far harder to claim fairly than families expect. Not every electrocution ends in death; some of the hardest cases involve children who survive with an amputated limb or a permanent disability, and whose families are offered a policy amount that bears no relation to a lifetime of need. This case study walks through one reported judgment of the Punjab & Haryana High Court, and what it teaches families facing a similar loss.

It supports our main guide on electrocution death compensation in the Punjab and Haryana High Court, which covers death claims and the writ procedure in full.

What happened

On an ordinary January afternoon in 2022, a six-year-old girl was playing on the terrace of her family’s house in a small town in Mahendragarh district. A high-tension line ran so close to the balcony that it almost touched it. The family had earlier asked the authorities to shift it. That afternoon, the child came into dangerous proximity with the live line. She survived, but lost her arm.

The judgment has been reported in the legal press. The family first went to the High Court in 2022, and the Nigam was directed to decide the claim under its compensation instructions of 15.07.2019. In February 2023 it sanctioned about ₹18.9 lakh. The family came back to the High Court, arguing that this figure could not compensate a child for a lifetime without an arm.

What the Nigam argued

The Nigam’s principal answers were familiar ones. It said the family had accepted the policy amount, so the claim was closed. It said the policy itself was a humanitarian concession that could not be enforced in court. And it blamed the child’s father for extending the balcony towards the line.

A policy written to give something irrespective of fault cannot be turned into a reason to give nothing more.

How the High Court decided

The Division Bench rejected each answer. The Nigam’s own inquiry report fixing responsibility had not been challenged and had been acted upon, so liability was not genuinely in dispute. The 2019 instructions themselves said the compensation was over and above what was admissible under applicable law, so accepting it did not bar a claim for just compensation. Liability for a high-voltage line near habitation was strict, and the Nigam had not shown that any exception applied.

The Court then assessed electric shock injury compensation itself. It fixed a notional income for the child, added future prospects, and awarded separate amounts for pain and suffering, loss of amenities, future medical needs and attendant care. The total came to about ₹99.9 lakh. The policy amount was not deducted, and interest at 7.5% per annum was allowed from the date the petition was filed, payable directly into the bank account. The Court did not, however, strike down the policy for being inadequate.

How electric shock injury compensation for a child is measured

A child has no income to lose today, so courts look at the life the child would otherwise have had. The Supreme Court’s decisions in Kajal v. Jagdish Chand (2020) and Sidram (2023), followed in Anshu, guide the heads usually considered:

In any electric shock injury compensation claim, the percentage of permanent disability matters greatly, because loss of earning capacity is usually scaled to it. Families should obtain a disability certificate from the competent medical board, issued under the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2016, and keep the earlier hospital records that show how the injury progressed. The same heads apply in Punjab, where claims lie against PSPCL or PSTCL.

The Supreme Court took a similar approach in Raman v. Uttar Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam Ltd. (2014) 15 SCC 1. There, compensation of ₹60 lakh for a four-year-old boy left with total permanent disability was restored, because safety measures for the live wires had not been provided.

The same principles of electric shock injury compensation apply in Punjab, where claims lie against PSPCL; see PSPCL electrocution compensation in Punjab. For the documents to secure immediately after an accident, see what to do after electrocution death; most steps apply equally to injury cases.

Frequently asked questions

Next steps

If a child in your family has been injured by a live wire, the medical records and the inquiry report together decide what can be claimed. Putting them in order early makes every later step easier.

Our office is at Sector 15, Panchkula, and we appear before the Punjab & Haryana High Court at Chandigarh and the District Courts of Chandigarh, Panchkula and Mohali. Families who wish to have their documents reviewed may contact us at +91 99881 70779 or singhsadvocate@gmail.com.