M/s.Maruti Udyog Ltd., petitioner herein, is the manufacturer of cars.  Respondent/complainant purchased a car from M/s.Sikand & Co., Janpath, N.Delhi – Respondent No.2 herein, which was manufactured by the petitioner for a consideration of Rs.1,08,674/- on 16.7.1990.  Respondent took the car to the petitioner in the year 1994, when the car had already run 20,000 km., with the complaint that some holes had developed in the sheet of the car on the door panels and there were rust spots as well.  Petitioner replaced the door panels, bonnet and hatch box.  According to the respondent, in spite of the replacement of the door panels, bonnet and hatch box, it did not take care to paint the new panels.  Colour of the car was Cairo Dust which discoloured and became a different colour.

          Alleging deficiency on the part of the petitioner, respondent filed a complaint before the District Forum in 1998.  Petitioner, after putting in appearance, took the objection that the complaint was filed beyond the period of limitation provided under Section 24A of the Consumer Protection Act.

          District Forum partly allowed the complaint and disposed it of with a direction to the petitioner to replace the vehicle on payment of 60% of the market price prevalent at the time of the passing of the order, on return of the vehicle in question by the respondent to them within 60 days.  Rs.3,000/- were awarded by way of costs.

          Petitioner, being aggrieved, filed an appeal before the State Commission.  Petitioner again took objection that the complaint filed by the respondent was beyond the period of limitation but without considering the objection taken by the petitioner, the State Commission disposed of the appeal by awarding Rs.50,000/- as compensation to the complainant instead of replacement of the car by taking 60% of the market price from the complainant from the date of the passing of the order.

          Counsel for the petitioner contends that the complaint was filed much beyond the period of limitation.  Under Section 24A, complaint could be filed within a period of two years from the date of arising of the cause of action.  That the car was purchased by the complainant on 16.7.1990 and the complaint was filed after 8 years in the year 1998 though the defects alleged by the respondent had come to his notice in the year 1994. 

Section 24A of the Consumer Protection Act provides that the consumer fora shall not admit the complaint unless it is filed within 2 years of the date on which cause of action had arisen.  Consumer fora have the jurisdiction to condone the delay on sufficient cause being shown for not filing the complaint within limitation.  In the present case, defects had come to the notice of the respondent in 1994.  Complaint was filed in the year 1998, much beyond the period of limitation provided under the Statute.  No application for condonation of delay had been filed.  In a recent judgement in Kandimalla Raghavaiah & Co. vs. National Insurance Co. Ltd. & Anr. – (2009) 7 SCC 768, Supreme Court has held as under :

“A bare reading of the impugned order shows that all these factual aspects have been duly taken into consideration by the Commission and we are in complete agreement with the finding by the Commission that the filing of claim by the Bank on 14^th July, 1988, would not have, in any way, helped the appellant. On their own showing, for the first time, only on 6th November, 1992 and then again on 26th October, 1995, the appellant had requested the Insurance Company to issue claim form to enable them to prefer a claim which request was declined by the Insurance Company on 21st March, 1996. By no stretch of imagination, it can be said that Insurance Company’s reply dated 21st March, 1996 to the legal notice dated 4th January, 1996, declining to issue the forms for preferring a claim after a lapse of more than four years of the date of fire, resulted in extending the period of limitation for the purpose of Section 24A of the Act. We have no hesitation in holding that the complaint filed on 24th October, 1997 and that too without an application for condonation of delay was manifestly barred by limitation and the Commission was justified in dismissing it on that short ground.”

          Since the complaint was filed beyond the period of limitation, the same could not be entertained. 

For the reasons stated above, the Revision Petition is allowed, the orders passed by the fora below are set aside and the complaint is dismissed being beyond the period of limitation.