JUSTICE V.K. JAIN, PRESIDING MEMBER

          The complainant / respondent took a loan of Rs.25,000/- form the petitioner bank under PMRY Scheme on 28.3.1984.  According to him, he had deposited his certificates such as Matriculation Certificate, Matric Mark Sheet and Admit Card with the bank on the assurance that after repayment of the loan, the said documents would be returned to him.

2.      The loan taken by the complainant was paid in terms of a compromise reached by him with the petitioner in a Civil Court.  The case of the complainant is that he approached the bank for return of his original documents, the same were not returned to him.  Being aggrieved, he approached the concerned District Forum by way of a consumer complaint.

3.      The complaint was resisted by the petitioner bank, primarily on the ground that no documents had been deposited by the complainant with the petitioner bank and therefore, there can be no question of the bank returning those documents to him.

4.      The District Forum having allowed the complaint, the petitioner approached the concerned State Commission by way of an appeal.  The said appeal also having been dismissed, the petitioner is before this Commission by way of this revision petition.

5.      The only question involved in this petition is as to whether the original matriculation documents were deposited by the complainant with the petitioner bank or not.  No documentary proof of the alleged deposit was filed by the complainant.  The petitioner bank being a Nationalized bank and the complainant being an educated person, he having argued his case in person, it would be difficult to accept that he deposited such important documents with the bank, without even taking an acknowledgement from the bank.  Moreover, no evidence has been led by the complainant to prove that submission of such documents was necessary under the rules of the bank or under the scheme in which loan was taken by him from the bank.  In the absence of such evidence, it would be difficult to accept the case of the complainant that the said documents had been deposited by him with the petitioner bank.

6.      For the reasons stated hereinabove, I hold that the view taken by the fora below is perverse in the sense that no prudent person acting on the material produced by the parties could have come to the conclusion, which the fora below had reached in this case.  The impugned orders therefore, cannot be sustained and are therefore set aside.  The consumer complaint is consequently dismissed, with no order as to costs.