In the Court of the
Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum, Unit -I, Kolkata,
8B, Nelie Sengupta Sarani, 4th Floor, Kolkata-700087.
CDF/Unit-I/Case No. 296 / 2009.
1) Mahendra Kumar Nahata,
2) Premlata Nahata and
3) Ms. Madhulika Nahata
All of : 75, Raja Basanta Roy Road, Kolkata-700029. ---------- Complainant
---Versus---
1) Unit Trust of India, through the Regional Manager,
29, N.S. Road, Kolkata-700001.
2) Ms. Sanchita Ghosh, Relationship Manager,
Private & Foreign Bank, UTI Asset Management Co. Pvt. Ltd.,
UTI Financial Centre, 29, N.S. Road, Kolkata-700001.
3) ABN AMRO Bank, Agent of UTI
Through the Head of Investment Service East (Subhrodip Bhowmik)
4) Mr. Somenath Dey, Wealth Manager, ABN AMRO Bank,
Van Gogh Preferred Banking, Trinity Tower, 2nd Floor,
83, Topsia Road, (South), Kolkata-700046.
5) Mr. Debayan Dutta, Investment Counselor,
Trinity Tower, 2nd Floor, 83, Topsia Road, (South), Kolkata-700046 -------- Opposite Parties
Present : Sri Sankar Nath Das, President.
Dr. Subir Kumar Chaudhuri, Member.
Smt. Sharmi Basu, Member
Order No. 27 Dated 31/08/2012.
The petition of complaint has been filed by complainants Mahendra Kumar Nahata and others against the o.ps. Unit Trust of India and others. The case of the complainants in short is that o.p. no.1 is a renowned Mutual Fund registered with Security Exchange Board of India and o.p. no.2 is a relationship Manager of UTI Asset Management Company who is acting as Counselor acting on behalf of o.p. no.1 and other proforma o.ps. are connected with investment and banking services. The complainants have invested in the Fixed Term Income Fund Plan namely UTI-FTIF Series V–I (13 Months) on 10th July 2008.
During January, 2009 the proforma o.ps. of ABN AMRO Bank viz. Mr. Somnath Dey, Wealth Manager and Mr. Debayan Dutta, Investment Counselor approached the complainant no.1 with investment proposal and collected their investment details and made investment port folios as well as assets allocation sheets and pointed out that the substantial amount of total investments is invested with UTI Fixed Term Income Fund. On request of complainants the proforma o.ps. also supplied the statement of funds investment and its corpus viz. UTI FTIF Series V-I (13 Months).
After going through the said statement in annex-A with the complaint petition the complainants understood the corpus of UTI FTIF Series V Plan I (July 2008 – 13 Months) is only about Rs.8.195 crores wherein the complainants have invested Rs.70 lakhs which comes to around 9% of total corpus of the fund (Rs.8.195 crores). For such low corpus of fund the complainants apprehending the risks, found awful position and were shocked and considering the huge amount of loss of benefit in future they switched over Rs.Rs.46.16 lakhs (approx) into UTI Bond Fund and redeemed the balance amount. By redeeming and switching over, the complainants had to pay 3% exit load amounting to Rs.2,22,085/- as per the accounts statement obtained from o.ps.
Later on the agent of UTI, Mr. J.M. Nahata came to the complainants and he was apprised with the loss suffered by complainants for h e investments under the scheme made through the said agent Mr. Nahata, the agent thereafter contacted UTI office, Kolkata and forwarded a statement to the complainants showing corpus of Rs.37,326.00 lakhs (373.26 crores) approx, against the said Plan.
As per the complainants both the statements provided by the UTI were found contradictory to each other and as a result thereof the complainants were misguided and suffered huge loss by paying 3% Exit Load for switching over Rs.46.16 lakhs approx in to UTI Bond Fund and had to redeem the balance amount paying 3% Exit Load due to wrong statement regarding the UTI FTIF Series –V Plan - I (July 2008 – 13 Months) supplied to the complainants. The complainants found the corpus difference from top to bottom in both the statements for same Plan supplied by UTI through Mr. J.M. Nahata, agent of the UTI and o.ps. respectively.
The complainants thereafter time and again requested the o.ps. to compensate their loss amounting Rs.2,22,085/- but they did not pay heed to the requests of the complainants. Hence the complainant has no alternative but to file the instant case before this Forum.
O.ps. had entered their appearance in this case by filing w/v and denied all the material allegation labeled against them and prayed or dismissal of the case.
Decision with reasons:
After scrutinizing vividly every nook and corner of all the documents brought before this Forum and hearing minutely from all the parties it appears that the complainants invested Rs.70 lakhs at company of o.p. nos.1, 2 & 6 and apprehending the risks and considering the huge amount of loss in future they switched over Rs.46.16 lakhs (approx) into UTI Bond Fund and redeemed the balance amount (para 7 of complaint petition). Here it is needed to be mentioned that as per COPRA, 1986 the upper limit of pecuniary jurisdiction of the District Forum is Rs.20,00,000/- which shall be decided by considering the total value of the goods or service in question and compensation if any claimed. In the instant case the value of the invested amount is Rs.70 lakhs and the switched over amount is Rs.46.16 lakhs (approx). It is beyond doubt that both these value are more than Rs.20 lakhs. Therefore, we are of the opinion that the service, regarding which the instant case has been arisen, is beyond the pecuniary jurisdiction of this Forum and we have no alternative but to dismiss the instant case in limini for want of pecuniary jurisdiction.
Hence, the case of the complainants is dismissed for want of pecuniary jurisdiction without cost with liberty to file fresh case with self same cause if action in respect of the same matter at appropriate Commission.
Supply certified copy of this order to the parties free of cost.
