By Sri.P.K,.Sasi, President
The case of the complainant is that he is having a land phone connection from the opposite parties and from April onwards the phone was not working. He submitted complaint immediately before the opposite parties and thrice reminders also submitted for which he was forced to travel five kilometers to the opposite party’s office by leaving all his jobs. The complainant is a real estate business man and telephone is an important factor for his business. The instrument of the telephone was changed six month before, by spending Rs.600/- by the complainant. A similar incident of nonfunctioning of telephone was happened to the complainant one and half years ago. Only after five months the opposite party rectified the defects on that time. Hence, this complaint is filed for getting relief.
2) On receiving complaint notice was issued to opposite parties. They directly appeared before the Forum and submitted detailed version. According to the opposite parties the complainant has filed this complaint by concealing the real facts and without any genuine cause and reason. They further submitted that the telephone connection was made unserviceable for the outstanding dues and that real fact was suppressed by the complainant. The outgoing calls of the telephone were banned on 12/05/16 for the reason of the nonpayment of the telephone bills. As per their records the complainant has made calls during the period 16/04/16 to 10/05/16. They further submitted that the complainant has not made any complaint of faulty telephone for the last nine months. Whereas, he has submitted a complaint regarding the working of the telephone on 11/05/16. The complaint was booked through 198 on 11/05/16 for non working of telephone. From 11/05/16 to 19/05/16 due to the cable damages caused by water pipes works done by the Velur Panchayath. It was informed to the complainant that because of the non availability of the cable pair for rectifying the telephone fault caused delay. Then upto 10/05/16 the telephone was working properly and thereafter the incoming call facility was also banned by BSNL. All these happened not because of any fault on the part of opposite parties and their employees. The opposite parties further submitted that in their version that there was no deliberate delay or any sort of latches happened on the part of opposite parties in rectifying the default in the case of complainant. They further submitted that as per Indian Telegraph Act the opposite parties cannot be held liable for any compensation as alleged in the complaint. The opposite parties denied all other allegations stated in the complaint and prayed for dismissal of complaint with cost. Then the case was posted for evidence and the points for consideration was that
1) Whether there was any deficiency in service
happened on the part of opposite parties ?
2) If so what cost and relief ?
3) From the side of complainant he has appeared before the Forum and submitted proof affidavit in brief in which he has affirmed and explained all the averments stated in his complaint. He also produced seven documents which are marked as Ext. P1 to P7. Ext. P1 is the copy of notice received from opposite parties dtd.04/07/16; Ext. P2 is the copy of Telephone bill; Ext. P3 another Telephone bill; Ext. P4 is the copy of letter issued by the complainant dtd. 13/06/16; Ext. P5 is another letter issued by the complainant dtd. 11/12/14; Ext. P6 is the copy of postal receipt and Ext. P7 is the copy of A/D card.
4) From the side of opposite parties counter statement filed by the Divisional Engineer for and on behalf of both opposite parties in which he has explained all the contentions raised in their version in detail. He also produced some documents which are marked as Ext. R1 series. We heard both sides in detail.
5) According to the complainant even after repeated complaint submitted by him, the opposite party has not rectified the defects of the telephone, which caused him huge financial loss as well as mental agony. Whereas, the opposite party contented that the connection and outgoing facility of the telephone in disputed was blocked by the opposite parties since, the complainant has not paid the bills properly. We have gone through the contents of the affidavit and perused the documents produced. Ext. R1 series call details produced by the opposite party would go to show that during the alleged period of defect, the complainant has made several calls to various numbers. There was no reply for the complainant to the contentions raised by the opposite party regarding nonpayment of telephone bills and the telephone calls made by him during the disputed period. The opposite party strongly argued that this complaint filed without any bonafide reason and concealing the real facts and pressed for compensatory cost. Considering all these points we are of the opinion that the complainant has not come before the Forum with clean hands which cannot be entertained.
In the result we dismiss this complaint with compensatory cost of Rs.1,000/- (Rupees thousand only) to the opposite party and the complainant is directed to comply this order within one month from receiving the copy.
Dictated to the Confidential Assistant, transcribed by her, corrected by me and pronounced in the open Forum this the 13th day of January 2016.
