Ahuja Transport Company vs NARESH BANSAL

THIS revision petition has been filed under section 21(b) of the Consumer Protection Act, 1986 against the impugned order dated 29.07.2013 passed by the Madhya Pradesh State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission (for short ''the State Commission'') in FA No. 358/2013, ''''Ahuja Transport Company versus Naresh Bansal '''', vide which the said appeal against the order passed by the District Forum, Gwalior, partly allowing the consumer complaint no. 465/2003, was dismissed on the ground of delay in filing the said appeal.

BRIEF facts of the case are that the complainant/respondent filed a complaint against the petitioner, alleging deficiency in transportation services and claiming a compensation of Rs.4 lakh towards financial loss alongwith interest and certain amounts for mental harassment alongwith cost of litigation etc. He alleged that the goods booked by him with the petitioner did not reach the desired place in time. The District Forum vide their order dated 13.09.2006, while partly allowing the complaint, directed the petitioner to pay a sum of Rs.4 lakh and another sum of Rs.88,000/- towards interest @6% from 11.12.2013 on the said sum and Rs.2,000/- towards cost of litigation; in total Rs.4,90,000/- within a period of one month. An appeal was made by the petitioner before the State Commission against this order which was dismissed by the State Commission vide impugned order on grounds of delay of more than six years in filing the appeal. It is against this order that the present petition has been made. At the time of hearing before us, learned counsel for the petitioner argued that there had been no delay on the part of the petitioner in filing the appeal. He has drawn our attention to the application for condonation of delay, filed before the State Commission, in which it has been stated and the complaint, in question, had earlier been dismissed by the District Forum on 21.09.2004. However, on appeal before the State Commission, the State Commission remanded the matter back to the District Forum on 24.03.2006, in the absence of the petitioner, with a direction to the District Forum to issue notice to the petitioner. However, no notice was issued by the District Forum to the petitioner and the impugned order dated 13.09.2006, partly allowing the complaint, was passed by them. Moreover, vide this order, the complainant was directed to send the original bilty to the petitioner, but no such action was taken by him. The petitioner was, therefore, not aware of the order passed on 13.09.2006. On becoming aware of this order upon the issuance of warrant by the District Forum, the petitioner submitted an application dated 05.10.2012 for inspection of the file in question as he wanted to file reply to the execution petition filed under section 27. Later on, the petitioner applied on 23.02.2013 for obtaining a certified copy of the order. An endorsement has been made by the Office on this application itself that the record of the case had been destroyed on 23.09.2006. However, a certified copy of the order was issued to them on 27.02.2013, after which the appeal was filed before the State Commission. The State Commission had erroneously observed in their order that the petitioner made attempts to inspect the file on 13.09.2006. However, when the attention of the learned counsel for petitioner was drawn to the order passed by the District Forum in which attendance of two Advocates representing the petitioner has been recorded, the learned counsel stated that they were not aware how the said counsels had appeared in the case.

WE have examined the material on record and given a thoughtful consideration to the arguments advanced before us. The basic issue involved in the present case is whether there has been an inordinate delay in filing appeal against the order of the District Forum before the State Commission. A perusal of the order of the District Forum says that Shri Ashok Khedkar and Shri Shaindra Khapse, Advocates appeared on behalf of the petitioner before the District Forum. The petitioner has taken the stand that when the case was remanded by the State Commission to the District Forum vide their order dated 24.03.2006, the District Forum did not issue any notice to them and the order dated 13.09.2006 was passed in their absence. However, the presence of two Advocates before the District Forum when the order dated 13.09.2006 was passed, falsifies this version. It is clear, therefore, that the State Commission has rightly observed that the petitioner had due notice of proceedings before the District Forum. Still, they gave an application on 23.02.2013 for obtaining a certified copy of the order in question. The State Commission has, therefore, rightly observed that there was a delay of more than 6 years in filing appeal before them and finding no substance in the application for condonation of delay, the State Commission dismissed the said appeal.

ON perusal of the grounds of revision petition and consideration of the arguments advanced before us, we do not find any irregularity, illegality or jurisdictional error in the orders passed by the State Commission. The said order is, therefore, upheld and the present petition is ordered to be dismissed at admission stage with no order as to costs.