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An employer is liable to pay compensation to a workman for (1) personal injury caused
to him by accident as well as for any, and (2) occupational disease contracted by him.
1. Personal injury by accident. An employer is liable to pay compensation to a workman if
personal injury is caused to him by accident arising out of and in the course of his employment
[Sec. 3 (1)].
Personal Injury. The word injury means damage done to a workman by some accident. The
Act contemplates for personal injury. It is not necessarily confined to physical or mental injury. It
includes psychological and physiological injury as well.
Indian News Chronicle Ltd. v. Mrs. Lazarus, (1951-52), 3 F.J.R. 190. A workman, in the
course of his duties, had frequently to go into a heating room and from there to a cooling room.
One night when he went into the cooling room, he got pneumonia of which he died. Held, the
death was due to personal injury.
Accident. The word accident means some unlooked-for mishap or untoward event
which is not expected or designed. If, therefore, an occurrence is unexpected and without any
design on the part of the workman, it is accident.
Arising out of and in the course of employment. The employer is liable to pay
compensation only if personal injury is caused to a workman by an accident arising out of and in
the course of his employment. It is not enough that the injury arises in the course of
employment. It must also arise out of employment. An accident arising out of an employment
necessarily occurs in the course of the employment but an accident in the course of
employment may not necessarily arise out of employment, though ordinarily it will.