Nidhi Verma Member

1        The present complaint has been received from the District Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission Amritsar by the order of the Hon’ble State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission Punjab, Chandigarh for its disposal. 

2        The complainant has filed the present complaint by invoking the provisions of Consumer Protection Act under Section  12 and 13 against the opposite parties on the allegations that the complainant is having one mobile connection of the above company bearing No. 9888112980 since long for the domestic purpose and everything was going on sell up to November 2016. 

October 2016  504.99       5110 paid under protest

November 2016 1965.28    1960d paid under protest.

December 2016              2510.21

January 2017                 1131.14                         Disputed Bills

February 2017               254.11

March 2017                             28.76

One Pooja and Aarti a callers from Chandigarh office made the call to the complainant from this No. 9517805010. Mr. Rahul better you pay Rs. 500/- and another agent Kuldip Singh a caller from Chandigarh called to the complainant pertaining to the agent of opposite party No. 2 from No. 9988961010 and offered to pay Rs. 2500/- and subsequently the complainant paid Rs. 2500/- on 7.3.2017 at their call under protest but company disconnected the mobile number on the same very day i.e. 7.3.2017 and till date it is not working. They never assigned any reason while disconnecting. The complainant is receiving threatening call even after making the payment of Rs. 2500/- from the above said numbers 9517805010 and 9988961010 even after repeated request of the complainant and the complainant has been suffering huge loss, mental pain, agony and harassment at the hands of the opposite parties for which the opposite party is liable to pay the compensation of Rs. 4,00,000/- to the complainant.  The complainant prayed the following reliefs:-

The opposite party be directed to continue the mobile connections of the complainant with immediate effect

• The opposite party be directed to pay the compensation of Rs. 50000/- to the complainant.
• The opposite party be directed to pay the adequente cost of the present litigation.

3        After formal admission of the complaint, notice was issued to Opposite Parties and opposite parties appeared through counsel and filed written version and contested the complaint by interalia pleadings that the present complaint filed by the complainant is liable to be dismissed on the sole ground that the complainant has failed to disclose the cause of action regarding which the complaint is relating deficiency in service. The bare perusal of the complaint shows that the complainant has failed to disclose any cause of action as regards the deficiency in service as has been alleged against the opposite parties. The present complaint filed by the complainant is liable to be dismissed on the ground that the present complaint filed by the complainant is liable to be dismissed on the ground that this commission has got no jurisdiction to try and entertain the present complaint. The appropriate forum for filing the present complaint by the complainant is under the provisions of Section 7B of the Indian Telegraph Act and the present tribunal Court has got no jurisdiction to try and entertain the present complaint. The present complaint is liable to be dismissed on the ground that this commission lacks territorial jurisdiction to try and entertain the present complaint. The complainant has while signing the customer agreement form has duly conferred the jurisdiction with his free consent upon the courts at Delhi and as such, the present complaint filed by the complainant before this commission is not maintainable. The present complaint filed by the complainant is liable to be dismissed on the ground that the bill generated by the opposite parties is as per the usage made by the complainant and nothing has been over charged by the opposite parties.  Therefore, the bill generated in December 2016 was Rs. 2510.21 which includes the ISD charges as per the usage made by the complainant, National Roaming Charges and Service Tax etc. As per the policy of the company the company has disconnected the mobile connection of the complainant bearing No. 9888112980 on account of nonpayment of the amount as per the usage made by the complainant. Thus, once the complainant has failed to make the payment of amount as due the company was within its rights to disconnect the mobile connection of the complainant as per terms and conditions of the agreement as entered in to between the complainant and the respondent company.  The complaint filed by the complainant is liable to be dismissed on the ground that there is no cause of action has arisen against the opposite parties. Thereafter, in the month of Jan 2017 the usage made by the complainant in total was Rs. 1831.14 which includes ISD call charges of Rs. 1050/- for 70 minutes and other local call charges whereby the total amount to be payable was Rs. 4341.62 which includes the outstanding bill amounts Rs. 2510.48 of previous month. The bill amount as generated only towards the usage made by the complainant and as per plan thereof. The opposite parties have sent the complete bill to complainant on each and every month and insptie of same the complainant has failed to make the payment of the outstanding dues. The complainant is himself at fault and trying to create wrongful gain to himself and wrongful loss to the complainant company. The allegations leveled by the complainant against the answering opposite parties are totally wrong and baseless. The complaint filed by the complainant is liable to be dismissed on the ground that the complainant being himself at fault cannot take the advantage of his own wrong. The complainant has failed to make the payment of the outstanding dues and as such his number was deactivated on 16.1.2017 and as the complainant failed to clear the outstanding dues despite repeated requests and reminders by way of calling as well as SMS, as such the company was forced to permanently disconnect the number on 5.4.2017. The complainant himself at fault cannot have any cause of action to file the present complaint. Even otherwise as per the averments made in the complaint, the complainant has termed the bills pertaining to period from December 2016 to March 2017 as disputed Bills. However, for the first time the dispute with regard to the said bills has been raised by the complainant in the present complaint. Further the bare perusal of the bills would show that the bills for the period of February and March did not show any charges except the late payment charges which the company is entitled to recover as per the terms and conditions of the monthly charges or bill plan. The company was within its right to disconnect the number on account of nonpayment of outstanding dues of the company.  The complaint filed by the complainant is liable to be dismissed on the ground that the opposite parties are demanding the legitimate dues from the complainant for which he has made the usage. The complainant is himself at fault and there is no deficiency in services on the part of the opposite parties. The complainant wants to create the wrongful gain to himself and wrongful loss to the opposite parties and thus a concocted story was made by the complainant to run against his liability to pay the bill amount against the opposite parties. The complaint filed by the complainant is liable to be dismissed on the sole ground that the mobile bill generated as per the usage of the complainant and as per the bill dated 1.11.2016 was Rs. 1960.27 which was not paid by him and the same was carried forward to the next bill, the total bill amount pending for pervious months as on 1.1.2017 was Rs. 4341.62. The complainant had made the partial payment of the amount i.e. Rs. 2500/- on 7.3.2017 and as such, his services were not restored. Till date an amount of Rs. 2124.49 is outstanding against the complainant till February 2017. Thus, the mobile connection was disconnected on 16.1.2017 for non payment of the mobile bills and the same was permanently deactivated in the month of April 2017.  The opposite parties have denied the other contents of the complaint and prayed for dismissal of the same.   

4        To prove his case, Ld. counsel for the complainant has tendered in evidence affidavit of complainant Ex. CW1/A alongwith documents i.e. copy of the receipt Ex. C-1 copy of payment detail Ex. C-2, copies of the bills Ex. C-3 to Ex. C-12 and closed the evidence. On the other hands, Ld. counsel for the opposite parties tendered in evidence affidavit of Pushakal Chauhan Ex. OPs2 1, certain telephone bills Ex. OP2 2 to Ex. OP2 6 and closed the evidence.

5        We have heard the Ld. counsel for the parties and have gone through the record on the file. 

6        Combined and harmonious reading of pleading and documents placed on record is going to prove that the complainant is having one mobile connection of the Vodafone company bearing no. 9888112980. In the present complaint ,Complainant paid 2500/- on 07.03.2017 after getting number of calls from the representative of the  OP who offered to pay 2500/-  but company disconnected the mobile number on very same day without informing any reason and till date it’s not working. Thereafter complainant receiving threatening calls even after making the payment of Rs 2500/-. OP in their written version stated that, the bill generated in December 2016 was Rs 2510.21/- which includes the ISD charges , National roaming , service tax etc. by the complainant and in the month of January 2017 the usage made by the complainant in total was Rs 1831.14/- which includes ISD calls and other local calls whereby the total amount to be payable was Rs 4341.62/- which includes the outstanding bill amount Rs 2510.48/- of previous month. The copy of bill herewith as Annexure OP2/5 . The complainant had made the partial payment of Rs 2500/- on 07.03.2017 and as such his service were not restored because Rs 2124.49/- is outstanding against the complainant. The complainant has failed to make the payment of the outstanding dues and as such his number was deactivated on 16.1.2017 and the complainant failed to clear the outstanding dues despite repeated requests and reminders from OP ,the company disconnected the number permanently on 05.04.2017. The bare perusal of the bills would show that the bills for the period February and March did not show any charges except the late payment charges which company is entitled to recover as per the terms and conditions of the monthly charges or bill plan annexure OP 2/2 , OP 2/3. Further the company was within the right to disconnect the number on account of nonpayment of outstanding dues of the company. However  opposite party denied that the representative of the company ever called upon the complainant to make the payment of Rs 2500 only against the total outstanding amount. Complainant is having enjoyed the facility and usage of telephone, cannot abdicate and evade the legal duty of paying the dues to the OP being defaulter the complainant is not entitled to seek restoration of the mobile service freely without discharging his duty of paying the outstanding dues. Thus the complainant suppressed the facts and approached this commission with unclean hands and hence the complaint is to be dismissed, as there is no deficiency in service on the part of the OP.

7        In view of above discussion, there is no merit in the present complaint and the same is hereby dismissed. The parties are left to bear their own costs. Copy of order will be supplied to the parties by the District Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission, Amritsar as per rules. File be sent back to the District Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission, Amritsar.

Announced in Open Commission

27.07.2022