Average - Definition - Law Dictionary Home Dictionary Definition average

Definition :

Average, a medium, a mean proportion used in various senses:-

(1) A service which a tenant owes to his lord by doing work with his avers.

(2) A shipping or insurance term. (a) Average, or more fully general average, is where any damage or loss has been properly and voluntarily incurred in respect of a ship or cargo for its safety, e.g., goods thrown overboard in a storm to lighten the ship. Such loss by maritime law is shared proportionately between the shipowners and the owners of the cargo, according to value. This risk is almost always covered by insurance. An Average Bond is a bond entered into by the consignees of a cargo with the shipowners, when a general average loss has been sustained by the ship, binding the former to pay their proportion as soon as ascertained. (b) Particular average is damage, or loss to a ship, or cargo, other than a general average loss. Such a loss rests where it falls, that is to say, is borne by the owner of the thing lost or damaged, or by his insurer, who compensates the insured in the proportion which the average loss bears to the whole insurance, and see the Marine Insurance Act, 1906 (6 Edw. 7, c. 41), s. 76, as the meaning of 'warranted free from particular average in marine insurance policies.' As to salvage loss and generally, see tits. 'ADJUSTMENT,' 'INSURANCE' and 'CONSTRUCTIVE TOTAL LOSS,' and consult Arnould's Marine Insurance and Carver's Carriage by Sea.

(3) Also a small duty paid to masters of ships, when goods are sent in another man's ship, for their care of the goods over and above the freight.

(4) Stubble, or remainder of straw and grass left in cornfields after harvest. In Kent it is called gratten, and in other parts roughings.

(5) means the average of the wages payable to a workman--(i) in the case of monthly paid workman, in the three complete calendar months, (ii) in the case of weekly paid workman, in the four complete weeks, (iii) in the case of daily paid workman, in the twelve full working days, preceding the date on which the average pay becomes payable if the workman had worked for three complete calendar months or four complete weeks or twelve full working days, as the case may be, and where such calculation cannot be made, the average pay shall be calculated as the average of the wages payable to a workman during the period he actually worked. [Industrial Disputes Act, 1947, s. 2 (aaa)]

(6) Average prices, such as are computed on all the prices of any Articles sold within a certain period or district. See e.g., Corn Returns Act, 1882 (45 & 46 Vict. c. 37), s. 9.

The word 'average' means 'arithmetical mean to estimate by dividing the aggregate of a series by the number of its units', Harbans Kumari v. State of Uttar Pradesh, (1979) 2 SCC 239: AIR 1981 SC 1215 (1216). [Uttar Pradesh Zamindari Abolition and Land Reforms Act, (1 of 1951) s. 39 (1)(c)]