The instant appeal under Section 15 of the Consumer Protection Act, 1986 (for brevity, ‘the Act’) is at the behest of complainant to assail the final order/judgment being Order No. 16 dated 14^th November, 2017 passed by the District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum, Kolkata, Unit-I (in short ‘Ld. District Forum’) in Consumer Complaint No. 504 of 2015. By the impugned order, the Ld. District Forum allowed the complaint lodged by the appellant under Section 12 of the Act on contest with a direction upon the respondent no. 1/opposite party no. 1 to issue ‘no due certificate’ in favour of the appellant and also to take further steps for expunging the name of appellant from the CIBIL by getting clearance from the bank in respect of ‘no due certificate’ will be issued by respondent no. 1, with a further direction  upon the respondent no. 1 to pay compensation of Rs. 5,000/- and litigation cost of Rs. 1,000/-  in favour of the appellant within thirty (30) days from the date of communication of the order otherwise the amount shall carry interest @ 8% p.a. over the entire sum till its realisation.

          The appellant herein being complainant lodged the complaint before the Ld. District Forum stating that being a retired Central Government Employee, he has made full and final payment in respect of his SBI Credit Card being No. 4006-6610-1713-5513 through a settlement in 2010 but the SBI Card Division had been pressuring him for making further payment for the said Credit Card. He approached the Banking Ombudsman, Kolkata with all valid documents for which a conciliation meeting was held on 11.11.2010 where a settlement was arrived at where the SBI Credit Card Division agreed to issue a ‘no due certificate’ for the said account for which the appellant will make further payment of Rs. 1,500/- only. Despite payment of the said amount of Rs. 1,500/-, the SBI Credit Card Division has not issued ‘no due certificate’ and on the contrary claiming fictitious amount of money amounting to Rs. 95,000/- by sending one after another bill from 05.06.2013 to 05.03.2015. The appellant has stated that initially he did not pay so much attention over the matter but subsequently finding some scent of foul play and realised that the SBI Credit Card Division has adopted an unfair trade practice and also causing harassment and mental agony to him without bothering the order of Banking Ombudsman. Hence, the appellant approached the Ld. District Forum with prayer for several reliefs, viz.- (a) a compensation of Rs. 3,80,519/- which is four times of the money claimed by opposite parties by their unfair trade practice; (b) issuance of ‘no due certificate’ within two weeks time and (c) withdrawal of his name from CIBIL List within a short period etc.

          The opposite party no. 1/respondent no. 1 by filing a written version resisted the allegations made by the complainant with an assertion that according to Banking Ombudsman Scheme if the matter was settled amicably before Banking Ombudsman then either of the party can comply with the said settled matter.

          On evaluation of the materials on record, the Ld. District Forum by the impugned order allowed the complaint with certain directions as indicated above. Being aggrieved and dissatisfied with the Award passed by the Ld. District Forum, the complainant has come up in this Commission with the present appeal.

          The appellant, who appeared in person, has submitted that considering the harassment and mental agony suffered by him the imposition of compensation of Rs. 5,000/- was much less than the actual loss suffered by him. He has also submitted that he had engaged an Advocate before the Ld. District Forum to conduct the case on behalf of him for which he incurred more than Rs. 10,000/- and in this regard he has drawn my attention to several money receipts issued by the Advocate appointed by him before the Ld. District Forum and as such the amount of litigation cost of Rs. 1,000/- awarded by the Ld. District Forum is on the lower side and it requires to be enhanced.

          Mr. Avijit Chatterjee, Ld. Advocate for respondent no. 1, on the other hand, has contended that the appellant never gave any justification for the compensation prayed for by him and as such in absence of any justifying clarification the compensation prayed for in the Prayer Clause of the petition of complaint was rightly rejected by the Ld. District Forum. He has further submitted that the receipts showing payment of fees to his Advocate were not produced before the Ld. District Forum and as such the same cannot be relied upon in this appeal.

          I have given due consideration to the submission made by the parties and scrutinised the materials on record.

          Undisputedly, the appellant had one SBI Credit Card bearing no. 4006-6610-1713-5513. By a settlement before the Banking Ombudsman on 11.11.2010, a settlement was arrived at where SBI Credit Card Officials offered to close the Credit Card and agreed to issue ‘no due certificate’ if an amount of Rs. 1,500/- is paid by the appellant as compensation for the extended period of payment. The appellant accepted the offer and agreed to make payment of Rs. 1,500/- on or before 30.11.2010. Accordingly, the Banking Ombudsman has held that the case be treated as settled amicably and the same was closed under Clause 11(1) of BOS, 2006.

          The statement of account indicates that the said amount of Rs. 1,500/- was debited from the account of complainant through a Cheque bearing no. 436893 on 01.12.2010. Therefore, it is quite clear that the appellant has complied with the terms and conditions of settlement by Banking Ombudsman dated 11.11.2010.

          Surprisingly enough, in spite of commitment the SBI Credit Card Officials did not issue ‘no due certificate’ and on the contrary issued one after another bill to the appellant and in this regard the letters containing their claim are reproduces below:

          I am astonished to see how after settlement of account the bills were being issued in favour of the appellant claiming an outstanding amount of Rs. 95,129.86 Paise. This not only indicates deficiency in services on the part of respondent no. 1 but also amounts to unfair trade practice under Section 2(1)(r) of the Act.

          In that perspective, the appellant/complainant is entitled to compensation. However, the Ld. District Forum has awarded a compensation of Rs. 5,000/- and being aggrieved and dissatisfied with such order the appellant has approached this Commission. To deal with the situation, it would be worthwhile to reproduce Section 14(1)(d) of the Act which runs as follows:

          “14. Finding of the District Forum. –

                   (1) if, after the proceeding conducted under Section 13, the District Forum is satisfied that the goods complaint against suffer from any of the defects specified in the complaint or that any of the allegations contained in the complaint about the services are proved, it shall issue an order to the opposite party directing him to do one or more of the following things, namely:

...........

                             (d) to pay such amount as may be awarded by it as compensation to the consumer for any loss or injury suffered by the consumer due to the negligence of the opposite party”.

          The sine qua non for entitlement of compensation is proof of loss or injury suffered by the consumer due to the negligence of the opposite party.  Once the said conditions are satisfied, the Consumer Forum would have to decide the quantum of compensation to which the consumer is entitled.  There cannot be any dispute that the computation of compensation has to be fair, reasonable and commensurate to the loss or injury.  There is a duty cast on the Consumer Forum to take into account all relevant factors for arriving at the compensation to be paid.

          Therefore, the assessment of compensation depends upon the facts and circumstances of the particular case. In the instant case, it is quite evident that the SBI Credit Card Division did not act in accordance with the commitment made by them before the Banking Ombudsman. They did not issue any ‘no due certificate’ resulting to such misery of the appellant for which he had to suffer much harassment and mental agony leading to filing of the complaint before the Ld. District Forum. Considering the sufferance of the appellant, the amount of compensation awarded by the Ld. District Forum does not appear to be commensurate to the loss suffered by him. The appellant has claimed four times to the amount claimed by the opposite parties which also does not appear to be justifiable. However, in all fairness, the Ld. District Forum should have awarded at least 10% of the claim amount in favour of the complainant/appellant which comes to Rs. 10,000/-. Considering the facts and circumstances, I think the compensation should have been awarded at Rs. 10,000/-.

          So far as the litigation cost is concerned, it reveals that the appellant being complainant contested the case before the Ld. District Forum by engaging an Advocate. The final order itself speaks that as many as 16 times the matter was appeared in the bench of Ld. District Forum for consideration and in that event certainly the complainant had to bear expenses for the purpose of engaging an Advocate and taking into consideration of the same, I think the Ld. District Forum should have awarded a litigation cost at least of Rs. 5,000/- in the facts and circumstances of the case.

          At the time of hearing, Ld. Advocate for the respondent no. 1 has placed before me a letter dated 29.06.2016 given by SBI Credit Card Division to the appellant to show that the SBI Credit Card in question became inactive for usage. Since, the development had taken place during the pendency of the litigation and further there is no reflection in the order to that effect, it will not alter the situation.

          In view of the above, the impugned judgment/final order stands modified to the extent that the respondent no. 1/opposite party no. 1 shall pay to the appellant/complainant a sum of Rs. 10,000/- as compensation and Rs. 5,000/- as litigation cost aggregating Rs. 15,000/- within thirty (30) days from the date of order otherwise the amount shall carry interest @ 8% from date till its full realisation. The other part of the order passed in the operative portion of the order by the Ld. District Forum is maintained.

          With the above observations and directions, the appeal stands disposed of.

          The Registrar of the Commission is directed to send a copy of this order to the Ld. District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum, Kolkata, Unit-I for information.