BEFORE THE DISTRICT CONSUMER DISPUTES REDRESSAL FORUM, PATIALA.

                                                Complaint No.CC/10/891  of 13.10.2010 

                                                Decided on:          12.9.2011

Som Nath Aggarwal aged 70 years son of Sh.Banarsi Dass resident of House No.13, Raghbir Colony, Model Town, Patiala.

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

                                      Versus

1.                 Punjab State Power Corporation Ltd., (Powercom)Head Office The Mall, Patiala through its Managing Director/Director.

2.                 S.D.O./A.E.E. Punjab State Power Corporation Ltd., Sub Division Commercial(East),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:     K.K.Jain, Advocate

For opposite parties:     P.S.Walia, Advocate

                                         ORDER

D.R.ARORA, PRESIDENT

          The complainant is a holder of the electricity connection bearing account No.MT-18/734 installed at the house of the complainant.

2.       In the second week of December/2009 the complainant received memo no.2920 dated 15.12.2009 from the office of op no.2 with the averments that the premises of the complainant was inspected on 14.12.2009 and M&T seals of the electricity meter were found tampered with , by the checking party and he was directed to deposit Rs.5930/- on account of theft of the electricity and Rs.6000/- as compounding fee.

3.       At this the complainant approached op no.2 and apprised  that he had never committed any theft of the electricity, having tampered with the M&T seals of the meter and requested to withdraw the memo but the officials in the office of op no.2 failed to pay any heed to the request of the complainant and rather advised him to deposit the amount failing which the electricity connection will be disconnected .At this 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 withdraw memo no.2920 dated 15.12.2009; to pay him Rs.50,000/- by way of damages on account of harassment and the mental agony experienced by him at the hands of the ops and further to pay him Rs.5000/- as costs of the complaint.

4.       On notice, the ops appeared and filed their written version. It is the plea put forth by the ops that the premises of the complainant was checked on 14.12.2009 by Meter Inspector Daljit Singh alongwith other officials and the M&T seals of the meter were found tampered. It was a case of theft of the energy and the complainant has been charged accordingly as per the rules of the PSPCL. A checking report was prepared at the spot. After denouncing the other averments of the complaint, going against the ops, it was prayed to dismiss the complaint.

5.       In support of his complainant, the complainant produced in evidence his sworn affidavit,Ex.C1, Ex.C2  the sworn affidavit of Deepak Kumar, Ex.C3, the sworn affidavit of Arvind Aggarwal and also produced the  document,Ex.C4 and the complainant closed the evidence.

6.       On the other hand, on behalf of the ops, their learned counsel produced in evidence,Ex.R1, the sworn affidavit of AEE Jatinder Garg of op no.2, Ex.R2 the sworn affidavit of Daljit Singh JE(MI) West Division/Technical,PSPCL,Patiala,Ex.R3, the sworn affidavit of Ranjit Singh,Incharge(MI) West Division/Technical,PSPCL,Patiala and also tendered the documents,ExsR4 t6o R7 and closed their evidence.

7.       The parties filed the written arguments. We have examined the same, heard the learned counsel for the parties and gone through the evidence on record.

8.       First of all it may be noted that the checking of the electricity connection of the complainant was not made by an authorized officer of the ops. Admittedly the checking was  conducted by Meter Inspector Daljit Singh and other officials. As per Commercial Circular No.56/2006 issued vide  Chief Engineer/Commercial (Sales Dte-1.)PSEB, Patiala memo no.6566212/SR-134.5 dated 17.10.2006 on the subject, ‘Commercial Circular No.34/06 dated 6.7.2006-----Clarification thereof,’ it is provided that, “an open house discussion with the filed officers under the Chairmanship of MD was held and it had been decided to issue following clarifications/amendments to Commercial Circular No.34/06 dated 6.7.06:-Keeping in view the problems faced by the field officers in dealing with the theft of energy cases, the matter has been considered and it has been decided that checking regarding theft of electricity be carried out by the following officers/officials of the Board.

9.       In our case it is not shown by the ops that the checking of the electricity connection of the complainant was made either by a JE or AAE of operation wing within his jurisdiction and therefore, the checking report,Ex.R6, qua the action taken on the basis of the same including the order of provisional assessmet,Ex.R5 issued to the complainant having raised the  demand of Rs.5930/- have to be ignored.

10.     Even otherwise simply because the M&T seals of the meter were found tampered, it was not a conclusive prove regarding the theft of the energy. In the case of the citation HSWEB( Now HVPN) and others Versus Bhushan Lal 2007(1)CLT 114, the Hon’ble Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission, Union Territory,Chandigarh observed , “ the allegation of appellants is that the premises of respondent were checked on 13.7.1998 by the raiding party and on checking found that both M&T seals were tampered with and terminal seal was missing. Now the question arises whether from the mere fact that M&T seals were tampered with and terminal seal was missing, a case of theft of energy is made out. The answer is certainly not. It was incumbent upon on the raiding party to install a parallel meter and should have noted difference in the energy consumed in both meters. Having not done so from the mere fact that seals were tampered with, it can not be said that theft of energy had been committed. The meter was not got checked from M&T laboratory that it had been running slow or was not running properly. In the absence of such evidence it can not be held that complainant had committed theft of energy”.

11.     As an upshot of our above discussion, it would appear that the demand raised by the ops from the complainant on the basis of the impugned order of assessment,Ex.C4 dated 15.12.2009 being illegal can not be sustained and the same is setaside and consequently, we accept the complaint and restrain the ops from recovering the amount vide the memo no.2920 dated 15.12.2009.50% amount of the aforesaid amount, if already deposited by the complainant in pursuance of the order dated 14.10.2010, whereby the interim relief for  the reconnection of the electricity connection was granted shall be refunded/adjusted in the future bills. In view of the facts and circumstances of the case, we can very well understand the harassment suffered by the complainant at the hands of the ops and therefore, we direct the ops to pay the complainant with a compensation in a sum of Rs.7500/- which also includes the costs of the complaint within one month on receipt of the certified copy of the order.The ops may recover the said cost from the Meter Inspector Daljit Singh, who conducted the checking unauthorizedly.

Pronounced.

Dated:12.9.2011

                             Neelam Gupta      Amarjit Singh Dhindsa    D.R.Arora

                             Member                Member                            President