General Manager, City Bank, & Anr. vs Mohd. Ayub, & Anr.

The appellant, Citi Bank Card Centre was the opposite party before the State Commission, where the respondent/ complainant had filed a complaint alleging deficiency in service on the part of the appellant.

Very briefly stated the facts leading to filing the complaint were that one Mr. Mohd. Ayub, the first complainant was the primary card holder of the Citi Bank Card and one Mr. Mohd. Usman was the additional card member as per material on record (appearing at page 28 of the paper book). Additional card holder Mr. Mohd. Usman unfortunately died in a road accident in the night of 15/16.3.2002. Since as a card-holder, the complainants were the beneficiary of the accident insurance, a claim was preferred by the primary card holder on the said demise of his brother but it was not agreed as according to the appellant, the ''add-on-card holder'' was not entitled to claim any compensation under the provisions of the contract other than Rs. 2,00,000, for which policy had been given by the New India Insurance Company. When the matter was not getting settled, a complaint was filed before the State Commission, who after hearing the parties, directed the opposite parties No. 1 and 2 to pay Rs. 23,00,000 alongwith interest @ 6% p.a. and the third O.P. was directed to pay the amount of Rs. 2,00,000 alongwith interest @ 6% together with cost of Rs. 2,000 payably by the appellants/opposite parties No. 1 and 2. Aggrieved by this order, this appeal has been filed before us.

Notice was issued to the respondents. Since no one is forthcoming, they were served through publication yet no one appeared, hence they are proceeded ex-parte.

We heard the learned counsel for the appellant at some length and perused the material on record. The basic facts are not in dispute that the deceased Mr. Mohd. Usman was an additional card-holder. What we have to look-in is whether the additional card holder would be entitled to the amount of Rs. 25,00,000? As per material on record, and not rebutted, the basic cover available to the card holder was Rs. 2,00,000 which was the undertaking of the Citi Bank to their card holders, whereas for ''Citi Bank Suraksha'' and ''Citi Suraksha Credit'' shield there was a tie-up by the appellant with Royal Sundaram and Tata A.I.G. Life respectively. Under Citi Bank Suraksha from Royal Sundaram, the personal accident insurance cover was Rs. 25,00,000 and under Citi Bank Suraksha Card Shield from Tata A.I.G. Life, the insurance cover was Rs. 2,50,000 in the case of death or total and permanent disablement. The arrangement has been produced before us in the form of brochure in which the agreement between the Citi Bank on the one hand and Tata A.I.G./Royal Sundaram on the other, clearly stipulate under the heading the scope and extent of coverage that the ''coverage applies to primary card holder only. It does not apply to additional card members'' (emphasis supplied). We have also seen policy issued by Tata A.I.G. and Schedule attached therein, wherein it is clearly stipulated that the beneficiary could be only ''principal card account holder.....'' In view of this, we are left in no doubt that the benefit under the arrangement between Tata A.I.G./ Royal Sundaram could go only to the primary card holder. Since the deceased Mohd. Usman was additional card holder, he could not be granted the benefit under the above coverage, in view of which, we are unable to sustain the order passed by the State Commission, which is set aside. Appellants cannot be held liable for any payment in terms of policy terms as discussed above.

The New India Assurance Co. had already shown its willingness to pay Rs. 2,00,000 as directed by the State Commission alongwith interest mentioned there in the order of the State Commission in sub-para 3 of para 13. The complainant would be free to proceed against respondent No. 2/O.P. 3 for getting the order executed as stated above under Section 25/27 of the Consumer Protection Act, 1986, in case this has not already been executed.

The appeal stands allowed in above terms.