BANK OF BARODA Vs. PARUL AGARWAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This revision petition has been filed by the Bank of Baroda (hereinafter referred to as Petitioner), seeking to challenge the order of the Uttar Pradesh State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission, Lucknow, dated 10.07.2006, in Appeal No. 627 of 2004. By this appeal, the State Commission had upheld the order of the District Forum directing the Petitioner to pay Rs.86,619/- with 4% interest and Rs.1000/- as cost and Rs.31,000/- with 4% interest and Rs.1000/- as cost, respectively to Ms Parul Agarwal and Ors (hereinafter referred to as Respondents).

(2.) Briefly, the complaint in the District Forum filed by Respondents was on the following grounds: Respondents 1 and 2 on 18.05.2000 deposited Rs. 1.00 lakh with the Banaras State Bank Ltd., (hereinafter referred to as BSBL) in Fixed Deposit for three years and on 13.11.2000 the Respondents No. 1 and 3 also deposited a similar amount in FDR for three years with BSBL. Thereafter, BSBL was merged with Bank of Baroda (Petitioner) and neither of the Banks gave any notice about the merger. On maturity of their FDRs, Respondents were paid Rs.93,841/- and Rs.1,176,986/- respectively, by the Petitioner instead of Rs.1,34,490/- assured to them on maturity of their FDRs. Thus, the Petitioner arbitrarily deducted Rs.15,000/- from the first FDR and Rs.16,504/- from the second FDR. This was a serious deficiency in service. Hence, the Respondents filed a complaint before the District Forum and the relief sought by them was for payment of Rs.31,941/- alongwith 18% interest.

(3.) The contention of the Petitioner on the other hand was as follows: In order to safeguard the interests of the depositors as well as in public interest BSBL was amalgamated with the Petitioner Bank by Government of India under Section 45 of the Banking Regulations Act, 1945. This fact was published in the Gazette of India Extraordinary and a scheme called B S B L (Amalgamation with the Appellant Bank of Baroda) 2002, was introduced by the Union Government. Para 5 of this Scheme provide for valuation of the assets and determination of liabilities of the erstwhile BSBL. It specifically indicated that the valuation of assets and liabilities in accordance with the scheme shall be binding on both the Bank and the depositors. Wide publicity was given to this scheme and notices were issued in newspapers informing the stake holders that pro-rata payment of 85.85% will be made to them. Petitioner had further stated that as per a Government notification dated 19.06.2002 no suit or legal proceedings can be filed against the appellant Bank for anything done which is in good faith and was done and intended to be done in pursuance of the said Scheme. Petitioner has further submitted that the reason why the Petitioner could only make the payment of 85.85% to depositors was because liabilities of the erstwhile BSBL exceeded the realizable value of its assets. The remaining amounts could only be paid if these were received from the Depositors Insurance Credit Guarantee Corporation (DICGC). However, till date DICGC released the remaining 14.15% only in respect of those depositors, whose deposits were less than Rs.1.00 lakh. Under these circumstances, there was no deficiency in service on the part of the Petitioner.