JAGIR SINGH SAINI Vs. PUNJAB NATIONAL BANK

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Neena Sandhu, Member"This is an appeal filed by the complainant against order dated 27.1.09 passed by District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum -II, UT, Chandigarh (for short hereinafter to be referred as District Forum) passed in complaint case No.1033 of 2007.

(2.) The brief facts of the case are that the complainant has a Current Account bearing No.3529002100226420 with Punjab National Bank (OP No.1) and the complainant obtained a loan from HDFC Bank (OP No.2) and for repayment of this loan, the complainant issued 36 cheques of the OP No.1 bank. The complainant again applied for fresh loan from OP No.2 Bank of Rs.5,00,000 and without the consent of complainant, OP No.2 illegally sanctioned the loan of Rs.2,50,000 and made deduction of Rs.51,496 from the fresh loan account of the complainant in an illegal manner and the fresh loan amount was payable in installments of Rs.8,875. The OP No.2 bank was taken the consent for ECS from the complainant for clearance of the installments of the said fresh loan from the account of the complainant with the OP No.1 and the dispute arose between the OP No.2 bank and the complainant, due to which the complainant stopped the payment of the ECS of the said installments and made written requests dated 26.10.2006 and 2.11.2007 to the OP No.2 bank with copy to the OP No.1 bank and the Reserve Bank of India. The OP No.1 bank i.e. Punjab National Bank deducted a sum of Rs.350 on account of stop payment charges from the account of the complainant. Despite the instructions given by the complainant to the OP to stop the ECS, the OP allowed the ECS from the account of the complainant. The complainant filed a complaint bearing No. CC179912006 and during the pendency of the complaint, the OP No.1 again allowed payment of ECS of Rs. 8,875 on 7.3.2007 and Rs.8,875 on 10.4.2007 on account of the said ECS in favour of OP No.2 bank. The complainant suffered a loss of Rs. 17,750 and also suffered a loss of Rs. 8,875 of one installment and Rs. 100 as ECS return charges. The above - said act of OPs amounts to deficiency in service and hence, the complaint was filed.

(3.) Reply was filed by OP No.1 and admitted that the answering lap received the representations sent by complainant on 26.10.2006 and 2.11.2007 which were addressed to RBI by the complainant regarding stopping the ECS as well as stopping the payment of cheques. The answering OP stopped the clearance of cheques bearing Nos. 617961 to 617966 and for that Rs.350 were deducted as stop payment charges. It was pleaded that the first request for stopping the clearance of loan installments through ECS was received on 28.10.2006, which was not required to be sent to the OP No.1 i.e. Punjab National Bank. As per the RBI instructions and guidelines on ECS system, the prior notice of 15 days was required for stopping the clearance of any cheque to the clearing house by the HDFC Ban k and not the Punjab National Bank. The OP No.2 was to intimate the clearing house regarding not to include the transactions pertaining to such customer/complainant in the ECS input file, which the OP No.2 failed to do so. As per Para No.7(iv)(c) of RBI Instructions it was the obligatory duty of HDFC Bank not to include the transactions pertaining to such customer/complainant in the ECS input file or withdrawal instructions had been submitted to CH (clearing house), the ECS clearing would have not effected and in case a debit record was repeatedly presented despite such withdrawal or non -existence of mandate for more than three ECS runs, the clearing house may consider not entertaining the future ECS runs of that particular user institution. In the instant case, user institution did not exclude the name of the complainant from the list and did not instruct the clearing house to exclude the name of the complainant. It was further pleaded that the installments through electronic clearance (ECS) on 7.11.2006 could not be stopped as the process for ECS installment for the month of November had already started by the time the request of the complainant was received and as per the RBI Guidelines OP No.1 had no role in controlling the ECS clearing system and the entire control of the ECS was in the hands of HDFC Bank and the clearing house (CH). It was also submitted that once ECS system starts, the debit branch i.e. Punjab National Bank would come to know about when the clearing house automatically debits the account as per the instructions of user institute and the ECS cannot be stopped until and unless the user institution instructs the clearing house regarding withdrawal and such mandate was to be issued by the user institution and the clearing house and not by Punjab National Bank and only then, the clearing house may consider not entering the future ECS of the user institution. It was denied that the complainant had suffered any loss on account of deficient services rendered by OP No.1 and submitted that any cheques debited through ECS system from the account of the complainant, that had been debited on account of the deficient services of OP No.2 (HDFC Bank) and if the HDFC bank had intimated the clearing house and followed the RBI guidelines, the respective amounts would have not been debited from the account of the complainant with Punjab National Bank on 7.3.2007 and 10.4.2007 for Rs.8,875 each (Total comes to Rs.17,750). It was further submitted that there was no deficiency in service on the part of OP No.1 and prayed for dismissal of the complaint.