KANPUR KANTEWALA Vs. JAIRAM KUSHWAHA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The present revision petition has been filed by M/s Kanpur Kantewala (hereinafter referred to as the 'Petitioner') being aggrieved by the order of the State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission, Gujarat (hereinafter referred to as the 'State Commission') in favour of Jairam Kushwaha and another (hereinafter referred to as the 'Respondents').

(2.) The facts of the case according to the Respondent who was the original complainant before the District Forum are that on 01.07.1998 he had purchased a weighing scale of 5 Tonne capacity for a total amount of Rs. 50,000/- for which he paid Rs. 15,000/- as advance to the Petitioner and the remaining Rs. 35,000/- were to be paid at the time of delivery. The carriage charges for the same were to be paid separately. Respondent stated that he paid the advance and thereafter on delivery the remaining amount of Rs. 35,000/- which included a cash component of Rs. 5,000/-. The weighing scale machine was sent to the Respondent through M/s Bhagwati Transport to whom he paid Rs. 2,000/- as carriage charges. In addition, he also incurred other expenses including in the installation of the said machine. According to the Respondent, the weighing scale machine being defective did not work properly and a complaint was, therefore, lodged with the Petitioner who sent his mechanic on a number of occasions to try to get it to work but despite this it stopped working and according to the mechanic, it could not be repaired because of inherent manufacturing defects. It also transpired that Petitioner had deliberately and intentionally fixed 3 channels instead of 5 channels for the support of the plate in the weighing machine and the thickness of the plate was 8 mm instead of 12 mm which was perhaps cause of various problems. Respondent suffered huge losses right from August, 1998 which were as high as Rs. 10,000/- per month. The Petitioner neither heeded the request of the Respondent to replace the weighing scale machine nor did he refund the cost of the machine being Rs. 50,000/-. Aggrieved by this, Respondent filed a complaint before the District Forum requesting that the Petitioner be directed to either provide a new weighing machine by replacing the old and defective weighing machine to the Respondent or refund him Rs. 50,000/- with 18% interest from the date of purchase till realization of the payment, Rs. 60,000/- as compensation for losses suffered and Rs. 1,500/- as litigation cost.

(3.) Petitioner on the other hand has denied that the weighing scale machine sold to the Respondent cost Rs. 50,000/-. According to the Petitioner, in fact, the Respondent only collected the quotation of a weighing scale machine which cost Rs. 50,000/- but the weighing scale selected by him had cost only Rs. 27,200/- plus sales tax of Rs. 2,720/- and loading charge of Rs. 80/-, totaling to Rs. 30,000/- which he paid. Further, no guarantee was given by the Petitioner to the Respondent and he was only informed of a reasonable warranty which is given on behalf of the manufacturer. Petitioner also denied that the weighing scale machine sold by him had any defects. In fact, on receiving a complaint from the Respondent, Petitioner sent his engineer to the Respondent's premises where he found another weighing scale machine and not the one sold by him but on humanitarian ground, the engineer repaired the same even though he was not required to do so. Therefore, there was no deficiency in service on the part of the Petitioner.