Dated: 21st March, 2020

PROFESSIONAL SKILL DEVELOPMENT ACTIVITY

LAW OF TORTS AND CONSUMER PROTECTION

B.A. LL.B. II SEMESTER

For the purpose of the Professional Skill Development Activity, the students are required to answer
any one of the two problem-based questions given below.

QUESTION 1

DNE Arena is a newly built cricket stadium in Noida with a huge capacity of 5000 seats. Mohan
went to watch the final match of the IGL (Indian Game League) which was being played at DNE
Arena between the teams Kolkata Night Risers and Chennai Super Wings. At the interval, while the
crowd was cheering for their respective teams, one of the stands where Mohan was sitting, collapsed
and unfortunately, 55 spectators including Mohan died on the spot. This being the major sports
tournament in the country, all the prominent sports channels were telecasting the events live. This
news was immediately aired by all news channels. Mrs. Mohini, (Mohan’s mother) was watching her
favourite serial on TV when she switched over to the news channel and saw this piece of news. She
was devastated to know about the tragic accident and as she scrolled through all the news channels
anxiously, she came across one channel which revealed the identity of Mohan among the list of
people who had died in this tragic accident. She suffered psychiatric injury on receiving this news.

Mr. Mohanty is an influential businessman and his son was also among the people who lost their life
in this accident. Extremely aggrieved and furious by the death of his only son, Mr. Mohanty yelled
before his family members that he would pursue any means to ensure that officials heading the
management of DNE Arena (run by politicians and bureaucrats) have to pay for this tragedy. Mr.
Mohanty wrote a letter to the editor of the most widely read online news portal in the country,
making the allegations that the Chairman of DNE Management Board, Mr. Mohanish, was involved
in a series of high-level corruption cases and sub-standard material was used for the construction of
the DNE Arena because of the misappropriation of funds by him. Specific allegations were stated by
him and it mentioned that the Management Board of DNE was ‘full of wicked and undignified
crooks’. He wrote this on the basis of a piece of news that he had read in a sub-standard weekly
magazine published one week before the accident took place. According to this news article, there
was a vague speculation as to the involvement of DNE Management in the corruption scandal in the
allotment of the construction contracts.

This letter written by him got viral in no time and Mr. Mohanish, who was also the Vice President of
Jagruk Janta Party was removed from this post by the party leadership because of the negative public
perception that was formed as a result of the circulation of this news article. Mr. Mohanish has filed
a suit for damages to the tune of Rs. 10 crore against Mr. Mohanty.

In order to investigate into the cause of the accident, an inquiry committee was set up by the State
Govt. and it was revealed in the reports that were submitted after three months of the accident that
the allegations of there being a corruption scandal in the allotment of construction contracts were
true. However, it also specified that the actual cause of the collapsing of the stand at DNE Arena was
not the use of bad quality construction material but the fault of the engineers and architects who had
performed mistakes in the calculations of the measurements of the length and height of the pillars in
the stadium. These were reputed engineers and architects who were skilled professionals and had
been hired by the DNE Management for the purpose of the construction of the stadium.

Identify and discuss all potential causes of action that may arise in tort law that can be raised
by and against each of the parties involved. (Mrs. Mohini, Mr. Mohanish, Mr. Mohanty). Also
mention the possible defences available to the defendants in each case.

OR
QUESTION 2

Mrs. Reena Mathur is a thirty-year old woman with a three-year old, infant daughter, Malti. Malti is
an active, cherubic child who loves to visit parks and playgrounds with her mother. Mrs. Mathur
takes her daughter frequently to the local playground which is located some kilometres away from
their residential society. Since she frequently visits this playground, Mrs. Mathur has befriended
other parents who visit the playground with their kids. One fine day as Mrs. Mathur was busy talking
with one of her friends, Mrs. Sharma and while Malti was enjoying on the swings, a twenty- year old
young man Sam entered the playground with a small puppy. Little Malti is fascinated by the cute
puppy and starts running towards the animal. Sam at this moment had just sat down on his knees in
order to tie his shoe laces while holding the leash to which the small puppy was chained with one of
his hands. Startled at the little infant rushing towards it, the puppy broke free from the leash and
started running outside the playground. Malti begins to follow it curiously and soon she wanders
over to the main road.

Just outside the playground on the main road, Sid is driving a car quite safely, well within the speed
limit and following all traffic rules. As soon as Sam realises this situation, he rushes out after Malti
in order to save her from a possible accident. He manages to save her from a possible collision with
Sid’s car. However, because of the speed with which he rushes to save Malti, he himself suffers a
collision with the car being driven by Sid and gets seriously injured. Taken aback from this sudden
accident, Sid loses control of the car and skids off the road and crashes into the playground
equipment. Shivani is driving her car right behind Sid and looking at the events before her, she puts
her foot down hard on the brakes in order to avoid a potential clash with Sid. However, she skids on
an oil slick and crashes into a tree. Next to this tree was the shop of an ice-cream vendor and Vedant
was standing there in order to buy some ice cream for himself when he saw Shivani’s car
approaching the tree. He thought that the car might hit him and he started running away screaming
‘Oh God ! Save me !!’ He isn’t injured but he develops a psychological condition due to the narrow
escape that he faced and begins to suffer from a paranoid fear of going out into the street. As a result,
he loses his job and his livelihood.

Mrs. Sarita Mathur, Malti’s grandmother, was on her way to the park and she witnesses the accident
suffered between Vedant and Shivani’s car. She suffers from a brief fright and composes herself. She
is told about the incident involving Malti, that her granddaughter, had just barely escaped a serious
accident. Hearing this and as a result of witnessing the collision of Shivani’s car with the tree, she
develops post-traumatic stress disorder.
Identify and discuss all potential causes of action that may arise in tort law that can be raised
by and against each of the parties involved. (Mrs. Sarita Mathur, Mrs. Reena Mathur, Sid,
Sam, Vedant, Shivani). Also mention the possible defences available to the defendants in each
case.

GUIDELINES:

1. The submission has to be made in MS Word format.

2. Word limit: 1500-2000 words

3. Font: Times New Roman

4. Font Size: 12

5. Line Spacing: 1.5

6. The text should be justified.

7. Footnoting to be done according to ILI Citation Pattern. (Available at:

http://www.ili.ac.in/footnoting12.pdf)

8. Submission has to be made in soft copy by uploading it on CollPoll.

9. The last date for submission: 1st April 2020 (by 23:59). Late submission will entail negative
marking of one mark per day. There shall not be any extension of deadline and no submission shall
be entertained after 3rd April, 2020.

10. Evaluation shall be done on the basis of the identification of issues, understanding and
application of the concepts taught in class, citation of relevant case law, quality of research,
expression and presentation of content in compliance with the prescribed guidelines.

Swaril Dania

Assistant Professor, Law

Delhi Metropolitan Education, Noida