New Delhi, Oct. 9 -- Indian Railways cannot hide behind hyper-technical objections to deny compensation to accident victims, the Supreme Court has ruled, holding that confirmation of a valid train ticket for the same date and route is enough to establish bona fide travel.

A bench of justices Aravind Kumar and NV Anjaria held that the burden of disproving a compensation claim will rest on the Railway Administration when there is clear evidence of bona fide travel. The court stressed that the absence of a police seizure memo or the failure to preserve physical evidence, such as the ticket itself, is not sufficient reason to reject a legitimate claim when the surrounding circumstances support the passenger's account.

The judgment, authored...