MEANING OF FIRE INSURANCE:. The Fire Insurance shift the burden of fire losses from their actual victims to all the members of
the society. It is a co-operative device to share the loss. It relieves the
insured from the horror of the fire losses to which he is exposed . The insurer
undertakes ti indemnify the insured
against any loss due to fire caused to the property insured in
considered of premium paid by the
insured. Thus fire insurance is the handmaid of the commerce as it is the
concerned with the protection of capital
and business properties. Business properties like factory building,
godowns finished and semi-finished goods and the like cannot be said to the be
immune from fire risk. Protections of properties from fire is indispensable for the continuity of any business. Fire
Insurance provides timely financial help
in case of loss of insured properties.
It also provides for the consequential
loss including profit due to the interruption of business on occurrence
of fire:
DEFINITION OF FIRE : According to the above definitions of fire insurance, the losses to the property
by fire are covered. The meaning of the
word, Fire” should be clearly understood in order to make the insurer liable
under the contract. For this purpose a fire
must satisfy two condition :
firstly there must be actual fire or
ignition: and secondly the fire must be
fortuitous in its nature. (1) IGNITION: The first condition requires
that there must be actual fire or ignition. In a case Byles J. said “The expression
in the policy we have to
construe is loss or damages occasioned
by fire”. These words are to be construed
as ordinary people would construe them. They mean loss or damage either
by ignition of the article consumed or
by ignition of part of the premisses where the article is: in the one of the case there is a loss,
in the other a damage occasioned by fire”. Loss or damage caused by excessive fire heat cannot be included in
loss or damage by fire, All that is necessary
to prove in the case of Fire insurance is that the loss is caused by
fire. The cause of fire is immaterial. Even if the fire is caused by the
negligence of the servants of the insured or of himself, the loss is covered.
Of course there should be no fraud or
wilful misconduct by the assured. If the
proximate cause of the loss or damage is fire, the insurer is responsible but, if the loss occurs not by the actual ignition
but buy a process resembling
fire, it is not regarded to be a loss by
fire. For this reason smoke damage which
arises from a faulty chimney. or from
the scorching of articles by overheated
irons or being placed too near to the fire, does not fall
within the scope of a fire policy. Loss or damages by explosion is not a loss by fire. The word fire does not extend
to chemical actions, which though they may correspond in this the effect to
fire. do not result in actual ignition.
Similarly loss occasioned by lightning
without ignition is not a loss by
fire: but where lightning results in the
ignition the loss caused by such
ignition is a loss by fire and can be recovered from the
insurer.
FIRE SHOULD BE ACCIDENTAL
AND NOT INTENTIONAL: The second condition stipulates that the fire should have been accidental and
not intentional. Any loss caused by a fire lighted purposely for some use is not a loss by fire
it is was intended. But there when property is accidentally burned in an
ordinary fire, such as a domestic fire, the loss is covered even if they the
fire remains under control. Here something is burned which might not to have
burned. Similarly when a fire is
purposely lighted but later on it
escapes control and causes loss to the property the loss is a loss by fire and
is recoverable under the contract..
