Exceptions to Strict Liability

And the seventh answer that is not an exception at all

Read this before writing an answer, because it is the difference between a good one and an average one.

Facts. M.C. Mehta v. Union of India, AIR 1987 SC 1086, decided on 20 December 1986 by five judges. Oleum gas escaped from a unit of Shriram Foods and Fertiliser Industries in a densely populated part of Delhi, and the Court had to fix the measure of liability of an enterprise carrying on a hazardous or inherently dangerous industry when an accident in it kills or injures people.

Held. The Court set out the rule in Rylands v. Fletcher together with its exceptions, and then declined to apply it. A rule evolved in the nineteenth century could not guide a modern industrial economy; law must grow to meet new situations; and Indian courts cannot allow their judicial thinking to be constricted by the law as it prevails in England, because India no longer needs the crutches of a foreign legal order. It laid down that an enterprise engaged in a hazardous or inherently dangerous activity owes an absolute and non-delegable duty to the community, is absolutely liable to compensate all those affected by an accident in that activity, and cannot rely on any of the exceptions which operate against the rule of strict liability under Rylands v. Fletcher; and that the compensation must be related to the magnitude and capacity of the enterprise so as to deter.

Why it matters here. The six exceptions remain the law for ordinary cases of escape from land. They are simply unavailable to the defendant who matters most: the hazardous enterprise. Chapter [Absolute Liability] works the rule out.

A worked example

A chemical plant stores chlorine in tanks beside a residential colony. Chlorine escapes and injures the residents. Consider five explanations the plant might offer.

"A terrorist cut the pipe." Act of a stranger, which would defeat strict liability, and would not defeat absolute liability if the plant is engaged in a hazardous activity.

"An earthquake of unprecedented force cracked the tank." Act of God, with the same result.

"The residents built their houses after we came." Not an exception at all. Coming to the nuisance is no defence, as chapter [Defences and Remedies in Nuisance] explains, and it is no answer here either.

"We were licensed by the State to store chlorine." Statutory authority may displace the rule if the statute authorises the very thing that happened and there was no negligence, and the argument becomes much weaker where the statute merely permits a business.

"We took every possible precaution." No answer at all to either rule. The whole point of strict liability is that care is irrelevant, and M.C. Mehta says in terms that it is no answer for a hazardous enterprise to say it took all reasonable care and that the harm occurred without negligence on its part.

What it does NOT mean

Reasonable care is not an exception. It is irrelevant.

The act of an employee or a contractor is not the act of a stranger.

Public benefit is not an exception. Common benefit means benefit shared with the plaintiff, not benefit to the public at large.

None of the six saves a hazardous enterprise in India. M.C. Mehta removed them.

Quick revision

1. Six exceptions: plaintiff's default, plaintiff's consent, common benefit, act of a stranger, act of God, and statutory authority.
2. Ramalinga Nadar v. Narayana Reddiar, AIR 1971 Ker 197: a mob is not an act of God, which is confined to elementary forces of nature without human agency.
3. The act of a servant or an independent contractor is not the act of a stranger.
4. Statutory authority never authorises negligence.
5. M.C. Mehta v. Union of India, AIR 1987 SC 1086: an enterprise carrying on a hazardous or inherently dangerous activity is absolutely liable and cannot rely on any of the exceptions.
6. Compensation from such an enterprise is related to its magnitude and capacity so as to deter.

Test yourself

1. State the exceptions to the rule in Rylands v. Fletcher. Six are recognised, and the Supreme Court set them out in M.C. Mehta v. Union of India, AIR 1987 SC 1086. The plaintiff's own default, where the escape or the damage is brought about by his own act or by an unusually sensitive use of his property. The plaintiff's consent, express or implied, to the presence of the source of danger, in the absence of negligence. Common benefit, where the thing is maintained for the benefit of both parties, as with the water installations of a building. The act of a stranger, meaning a person over whom the defendant has no control and whose deliberate act was not foreseeable, which does not extend to the act of a servant or of an independent contractor doing the defendant's work. An act of God, that is, an escape caused by natural forces without human intervention and so extraordinary that no reasonable foresight could provide against it. And statutory authority, where the statute authorises the very thing complained of, though it never authorises negligence.

2. Are these exceptions available to a hazardous industry in India? No. In M.C. Mehta v. Union of India, AIR 1987 SC 1086, a Bench of five judges considered the escape of oleum gas from a plant in a densely populated part of Delhi, set out the rule in Rylands v. Fletcher with its exceptions, and declined to apply it, holding that a rule evolved in the nineteenth century could not govern a modern industrial economy and that Indian courts need not follow English law. It laid down that an enterprise engaged in a hazardous or inherently dangerous activity owes an absolute and non-delegable duty to the community, is absolutely liable for harm resulting from an accident in that activity, and cannot rely on any of the exceptions which operate against strict liability under Rylands v. Fletcher; and it held that the compensation must be related to the magnitude and capacity of the enterprise so that it has a deterrent effect. The six exceptions therefore remain the law for ordinary escapes from land and are unavailable in precisely the class of case where most modern harm occurs.

3. Is the act of a contractor employed by the defendant an "act of a stranger"? No. The exception protects a defendant against the deliberate and unforeseeable act of a person over whom he has no control, and a contractor engaged to do his work is not such a person. Rylands v. Fletcher itself makes the point: the reservoir was built by independent contractors whose failure to block the disused shafts caused the escape, and the defendants were nevertheless held liable. The same is true of a servant. What the exception covers is the act of a genuine outsider, such as a trespasser or a saboteur, whose intervention the defendant could not reasonably have anticipated or guarded against.