Complainant Surinder Kumar  through the present complaint filed U/s 12 of the Consumer Protection Act, 1986 (hereinafter called the Act) has prayed for issuance of the necessary directions to the titled opposite parties to exempt his payment of bills being Scheduled Caste Person as per policy of the Punjab Govt. and also not to recover the amount of bill in dispute and to consider his load as .986 KW and to recover the actual consumption amount from him after giving concession of 200 free units in future. Opposite parties be also directed to restrain from disconnecting his electric connection, till the final decision of the complaint. He may be awarded compensation to the tune of Rs.10,000/- for mental agony, physical torture and financial loss caused by the opposite parties to him due to deficient service and unfair trade practice on the part of the opposite parties.   

2.       The case of the complainant in brief is that he has got installed an electric connection at his house  bearing account No.3000325676 in his name and has been paying the electricity charges to the opposite parties regularly without any default and thus he is consumer of the opposite parties. He is a poor labourer and belongs to Scheduled Caste Community. He has a very small house 200 units P.M. of the S.C. Community has been exempted by the Govt. of Punjab. His sanctioned and existing load is 0.986 KW and status of the meter is also ‘O’. He deposited security of Rs.1370/- vide receipt No.20001486348 dated 3.1.2014 in the office of SDO Sub Urban Gurdaspur. He received first bill of this connection from 1.2.2014 to 1.4.2014 for Rs.550/- which he had paid. This bill was on the basis of test report and according to test report his load was less than 1 KW i.e. 0.986. He being S.C. approached the opposite parties and requested for checking of his load and exemption of bills, upon which his load was checked and found to be 0.986 KW. The opposite party no.4 told him that load of his house is in excess which is to be decreased and for this purpose he demanded Rs.10,000/- as gratification which he did not agree. On 23.4.2014, he moved an application to opposite party no.2 for checking his load, then Sh.Satnam Singh J.E. checked the load of his house and reported load less than 1 KW, but thereafter no further action was taken by the department. Thereafter, he approached the opposite party no.3 and told that opposite party no.4 has demand gratification of Rs.10,000/- from him for exemption of his bill, but opposite party no.3 also did not give any reply. Then, he approached the opposite party no.5 and requested for exemption of his bill, who sent HS Bajwa AAE for checking of his load on 7.5.2014 who reported load of complainant as 0986 KW vide report dated 13.5.2014.  The opposite parties issued bill dated 25.6.2014 to him for Rs.2270/-, in which total consumption made by him is shown as 232 units, but due amount has been mentioned as Rs.2270/- by due date i.e. 10.7.2014, which is totally wrong, exaggerated, arbitrary, much more than the actual consumption made by him. He never used the electricity energy to this extent nor he was in arrears. Thereafter, he has approached to the opposite party no.2 and requested them to rectify the bill and to receive the actual consumption charges, as he never used electricity to such an extent for which the bill is issued, but the opposite party refused to admit his claim and threatening to disconnect the electricity supply in the event of non payment of the impugned demand. Due to the illegal act and conduct of the opposite parties he has suffered great mental agony and he has suffered mental as well as physical harassment at the hands of the opposite parties. Hence this complaint.

3.       Upon notice, the opposite parties appeared and filed their joint written reply through the counsel by taking the preliminary objections that the complainant has no cause of action to file the present complaint; the complaint of the complainant is not legally maintainable; the complainant leveled false and frivolous allegations in the present complaint and made them basis of his complaint. Such type of allegations cannot be looked into by the Ld.Forum and even it needs a lot of evidence and cross examination. The procedure provided before the Ld.Forum is summary one and as such the present complaint is liable to be dismissed; the complainant previously also filed the complaint on the same facts and withdrew it at the argument stage without any reason. The complainant again filed the present complaint with the same allegations which is the abuse of the process of law and complaint is liable to be dismissed on this ground. On merits, it was submitted that the complainant applied for connection on 2.1.2014 and he has applied load of .986 KW. The connection has been released on 6.2.2014. The complainant on 3.4.2014 gave application for getting exemption by alleging that he belongs to S.C.category. On his application Sh.Manohar Lal J.E. made the spot inspection on 15.4.2014 and as per his report the load of the complainant is more than 1 K.W. The A.E.E. again referred the application to Manohar Lal J.E. to check the load. The load of the complainant again checked on 18.4.2014 and at the spot the complainant was found using 7 Lamps, 3 fans, five plugs and One BHP Motor and he submitted his report. After calculation the load of the complainant again found to be more than 1 KW i.e. 1.05 KW. After receiving the report, the application has been sent vide Diary No.5 Dated 25.4.2014 to revenue branch. As per checking report the amount of Rs.468/- has been charged for load more than the sanctioned load and the load of the complainant has been extended to 1.046 KW. As his load is more than 1000 watt, as such he is not entitled for any exemption regarding the free unit. The complainant after that moved an application dated 7.5.2014 to again check his load. On his application, the meter was again checked by Hirdeypal Singh Bajwa on 13.5.2014 and as per his report the load of the complainant has been decreased and become less than 1000w. From its report, it becomes clear that the complainant decreases the lamps from 7 to 6 and decreases the number of plugs from 5 to 4. The circular in this regard clearly provides that once the load has been increased from 1000watt, after that even if the load has been deceased even then the complainant is not entitled for any exemption. So, the above fact clearly shows that the complainant is not entitled for any exemption. All other averments made in the complaint have been denied and lastly the complaint has been prayed to dismiss with costs.       

4.       Complainant tendered into evidence his own affidavit Ex.C1,Ex.C-1/A and Ex.C14, alongwith other documents Ex.C3 to Ex.C13 and closed the evidence.

5.       Sh.Harmanpreet Singh Gill S.D.O. tendered into evidence his own affidavit Ex.OP-1, alongwith other documents Ex.C2 to Ex.C5 and closed the evidence.

6.       Both the parties have produced/filed their respective affidavits and other related documents in evidence to support their pleadings/objections on record and the learned counsels for the litigants have duly put forth their respective arguments. We have carefully considered and perused all the available material while adjudicating the present complaint.

7.     We find that the complainant Surinder Kumar being the consumer of the OP Corporation and belonging to the S.C. category Ex.C2 had rightfully applied Ex.C6 for the entitled concessions/rebates/exemptions as announced and made available by the State Govt. to his category of consumers. Further, the connected Load was determined on 17.04.2014 at 0.986 KW Ex.C7 by the designated Officer/official of the OP service providers and further re-checking/inspection (at such a conspicuously short interval) on 23.04.2014, itself supported the complainant’s allegation of malafide at the OP4 JE; thus, we set-aside the impugned Report along with the impugned consumption Bill for Rs.2270/- . Somehow, we are inclined to withhold our opinion on the alleged malafide since it shall be the prerogative of the OP employer to initiate domestic inquiry/ disciplinary action against their delinquent employees. However, we find the OP Corporation as guilty of ‘deficiency in service’ under the Act and thus hold them liable to an adverse award under the Act.             

 8.       In the light of the all above, we partly allow the present complaint and ORDER the OP Corporation to set aside the impugned Consumption Bill and instead draw appropriate but legally valid Consumption Bills duly allowing the entitled concessions/rebates/exemptions as per the State Govt. Policy to such category(S.C.) of consumers besides to pay Rs.3,000/- as compensation and Rs. 2,000/- as cost of litigation to the complainant within 30 days of the receipt of the copy of these orders otherwise the awarded amount shall attract interest @ 9% PA from the date of orders till actually paid. 

9.           Copy of the order be communicated to the parties free of charges. After compliance, file be consigned to records.

                                                                              (Naveen Puri)

                                                                                    President.

Pronounced:                                                        (Jagdeep Kaur)       

August 28,2015                                                          Member

*MK*