Doctrine of Vicarious Liability

Hello readers

Vicarious liability or master and servant relationship 

 Before going to know about vicarious liability, we should know what is liability?

Liability is nothing but violation of law or legal norms which may be in civil or criminal nature and Therefore it can give rises to civil liability and criminal liability.

Civil liability are civil wrongs or private infringement of rights and whoever breaches civil wrongs then they are liable under remedial liability like damages and compensation whereas criminal liability are public wrongs committed against state and whoever breaches criminal wrongs then they are liability for penal liability such as punishment or fine.

Now come back to vicarious liability 

Generally a person is liable for his own wrongful or unlawful acts and that person is held liable for committing such offences. In certain cases, however, vicarious liability, deals with the cases where one person is liable for the acts of others.

The common example of vicarious liability are

1. Master and servant relationship 

2. Principal and agent 

3.partners relationship 

Master and servant relationship 

A master is the one who employs a servant to do certain acts under his direction and control and if that servant breaches law or breaks law then master is liable but not the servant.

To constitute the liability of the master, then following essential ingredients should be fulfilled

1. The wrong committed by servant 

2. The wrong committed by the servant during the course of employment.

Example:if a master driver hits a car and injured someone badly during the course of employment, then master is liable but not servant.

Therefore the whole doctrine of vicarious liability is based on 2 maxims i.e

1. Qui facit per alium facit per se:

It means if a person does an act through another shall be deemed to do an act by himself.

2.Respondant superior:

It means that the superior or master should be held responsible for the acts done by others or servant..