BEFORE THE DISTRICT CONSUMER DISPUTES REDRESSAL FORUM, PATIALA.

                                      Complaint No.CC/10/874 of 5.10.2010 

                                      Decided on:          9.9.2011

Lal Chand son of Ram Partap R/o village Jalalabad, Tehsil and District Patiala.

                                                                             -----------Complainant

                                      Versus

1.                 Punjab State Power Corporation Ltd., through its Chaiman/Secretary. Head Office, The Mall, Patiala.

2.                 Sub Divisional Officer, Punjab State Power Corporation Ltd., Sub Division Rohar Jagir Tehsil Dudhan Sadhan, District Patiala.

                                                                             ----------Opposite parties.

                                      Complaint under Section 12 of the

                                      Consumer Protection Act.

                                      QUORUM

                                      Sh.D.R.Arora, President

                                      Sh.Amarjit Singh Dhindsa, Member

                                      Smt.Neelam Gupta, Member

Present:

For the complainant:     Sh.Tarun Sharma, Advocate

For opposite parties:     Sh.Pawan Puri, Advocate

                                         ORDER

D.R.ARORA, PRESIDENT

          The complainant is a consumer of the domestic electricity connection bearing a/c No.P-26DF210371K having a sanctioned load of 2.82KW.

2.       On 29.9.2010 when the complainant was present in his house he was told by his neighbour that some officials of the ops alongwith Raj Kumar with whom the complainant has got a rivalry were standing in front of the room of the complainant and they were tampering with the meter of the electricity of the complainant. At this the complainant approached them and asked as to why they were tampering with the meter of the electricity. The officials of the ops levelled the allegations of theft against the complainant and said that they had recovered the wire which was being used for  committing theft of the energy. They handed over a false checking report to the complainant to have been prepared already in the office, which was signed by Raj Kumar the enemy of the complainant. No checking was conducted in the presence of the complainant or the members of his family.

3.       The complainant visited the office of op no.2 on 30.9.2010 but they failed to pay any heed to the request of the complainant and rather they served a demand notice no.1318 dated 30.9.2010 having raised the demand of Rs.30413/- by way of penalty and further demanded Rs.15000/- as the compounding fee and threatened him to deposit the amount within one week failing which to disconnect the supply to the electricity connection of the complainant.

4.       The complainant has described the aforesaid demand to be illegal, unjust and against the principles of natural justice. Accordingly the complainant approached this Forum through the present complaint brought under Section 12 of the Consumer Protection Act,1986 (for short the Act) for a direction to the ops to  take back the order no.1318 dated 30.9.2010; to award him compensation in a sum of Rs.20,000/- on account of the harassment and the mental agony experienced by him at the hands of the ops and further to pay him Rs.5500/- as costs of the litigation.

5.       On notice, the ops papered and filed their written version. It is the plea taken up by the ops that the complainant is a consumer of the ops. The complainant has not represented the facts truly. The connection of the complainant was checked by the officers of the ops on 29.9.210 in the presence of Raj Kumar,neighbour of the complainant. The complainant was found committing theft of the energy by by-passing the meter. The mode and manner of committing the theft of the energy has been described in the checking report. It is also explained that it was reported by the checking officer that the complainant had made a joint in the single phase cable of the Power Corporation from the roof of his house and by erecting 10 meter private cable and he had installed 6 condensors with the said cable with the help of which he made a hook(Kundi) for taking the direct supply from the service line.A checking report was prepared and the copy of the same was given to the consumer.

6.       It is further averred that on the basis of the checking report memo no.1318 dated 30.9.2010 having raised the demand of Rs.30413/- was issued against the complainant who was also advised to file the objections against the order of provisional assessment before the competent authority, if he so desired. The complainant failed to file the objections before the competent authority. It is denied if the complainant had any enmity with Raj Kumar. The checking officers had no malafide intention against the complainant. The complainant intentionally had not signed the checking report. On these grounds, the ops contested the claim of the complainant and ultimately, it was prayed to dismiss the complaint.

7.       In support of his claim, the complainant produced in evidence his sworn affidavit,Ex.C1, Ex.C2 the sworn affidavit of Krishan Kumar alongwith the documents,Exs.C3 to C6 and his learned counsel closed the evidence.

8.       On the other hand, on behalf of the ops their learned counsel produced in evidence,Ex.R1, the written statement in the form of an affidavit of Mr.J.K.Jindal SDO(Operation) of op no.2, Ex.R2, the sworn affidavit of Rehmal Singh, Additional Assistant Engineer, Operation of op no.2 alongwith the documents,Exs.R3 to R9 and their learned counsel closed evidence.

9.       The parties failed to file the written arguments. We have heard the leaned counsel for the parties and gone through the evidence on record.

10.     ExR3 is the copy of the checking report dated 29.9.2010 got proved by the ops with the help of the sworn affidavit,Ex.R2 of Additional Assistant Engineer Rehmal Singh of op  no.2, who had conducted the checking. As per the checking report,Ex.R3, the consumer had been committing theft of the energy by way of having connected the single phase service cable from above the roof of the room with a 10 meter private cable and having installed 6  condensers by running the submersible motor of 3BHP having by-passed the meter. The meter was lying stopped. The 10 meter cable and the condensers were got into possession. The report is shown to have been singed by Raj Kumar.

11.     Ex.C6 is the order of provisional assessment conveyed to the complainant vide memo no.1318 dated 30.9.2010 having raised the demand of Rs.30413/- on account of the theft of the energy and further having advised to deposit Rs.15000/-as compounding fee to avoid the police action.

12.     It was submitted by Sh.Tarun Sharma, the learned counsel for the complainant that no theft was being committed by the complainant and the entire story has been made out by the officials of the ops at the instance of Raj Kumar with whom the complainant has got an enmity and who was jealous of the complainant.

13.     It was also submitted by Sh.Sharma, that had the checking been conducted in the presence of the complainant, the officials of the ops would have got the checking report signed by the complainant and in case he made a refusal it was expected of  Additional Assistant Engineer, Rehmal Singh to have taken a note on the checking report regarding the refusal to have been made by the complainant to sign the report.

14.              On the other hand, it was submitted by Sh.Pawan Puri, the learned counsel for the ops that the complainant was admittedly served with the order of provisional assessment,Ex.C6,whereby he was advised  that in case  he was not agreeable to the order of provisional assessment, he could prefer the appeal within 15 days before SE(OP), a Designated Authority under the Electricity Supply Code and Related Matter Regulations 2007 but the complainant failed to prefer any objections qua his grievance that neither the report was got signed from him nor any endorsement of the refusal to sign the same on his part was made. He also placed reliance upon the citation Uttari Haryana Bijlee Vitran Nigam Limited & Anr. Versus Karam Chand 2010(2)CLT 3 , of the Hon’ble National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission, New Delhi for the observations, “if the respondent was aggrieved with the provisional assessment made by the Assessing Officer, it was open to him to file objection and eventually to move the Appellate Authority and Statutory Body, constituted under the Act. The notice, imposing penalty was also acknowledged by respondent. We do not feel impressed about any action resorted to by the respondent challenging either the alleged inspection or imposition of penalty, as required under the Act.”

15.     We have considered the submissions and are of the considered view that the complainant having had the occasion and the opportunity to prefer an appeal against the order of provisional assessment before the appellate authority and statutory body, constituted under the Act had not resorted to the same and this would go to belie all the allegations made by the complainant that the checking was not conducted in his presence and that the false report has been made by the officials of the ops at the instance of Raj Kumar who is enmical towards him.

16.     Usually it is the grievance expressed by the consumer that the checking report is not got signed by a respectable person of the locality but now in this case when the report is shown to have been got signed from a resident of the locality  a false allegation is made by the complainant that Raj Kumar is enimical towards him but without disclosing any basis for the enmity between him and Raj Kumar. The complainant has not produced in evidence any affidavit of a person of his locality to show that the complainant has got any enmity with Raj Kumar.Affidait, Ex.C2 of Krishan Kumar, also does not speak about the basis of the rivalry between the complainant and said Raj Kumar. We do not find any reason to disbelieve the version regarding the complainant having been found committing theft of the energy unauthorisdly as per the sworn affidavit,Ex.R2 of Additional Assistant Engineer Rehmal Singh, who has got no motive or malice to depose falsely against the complainant. Consequently, we do not find any reason to disagree with the procedure adopted by the ops in having raised the demand of Rs.30413/- from the complainant regarding theft of the energy and consequently we do not find any substance in the complaint and the same is hereby dismissed.

Pronounced.

Dated:9.9.2011

                                                Neelam Gupta                  D.R.Arora

                                                Member                            President