AGNES DMELLO Vs. CANARA BANK

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE complainant, who is the appellant before us, had hired a locker from the Canara Bank at its Gokul Branch in Bangalore. The grievance with which the complainant approached the State Commission is that valuable items of jewellery have been kept by her in the locker, that on 19th August, 1987, she came to know from the Bank that the locker in question was lying open obviously for the reason that it was unauthorisedly opened by some body and all its contents have been removed and that as a result thereof, she has suffered very heavy loss. The complaint was filed before the State Commission on 30.3.1991. It was summarily dismissed by the State Commission on the ground that since more than three years had elapsed from the date on which the incident of unauthorised removal of jewellery from the locker came to her knowledge, the complaint was barred by limitation.

(2.) ON going through the pleadings, we find it averred that after the occurrence of the incident, the bank kept on informing the complainant from time to time that the whole matter was being investigated by them and that the incident had also been reported to the police and that action was being pursued by the Police also. Unfortunately, those investigations carried out by the Bank as well as by the Police did not produce any concrete results and it was on coming to know about such failure that the petitioner approached the State Commission with the complaint petition claiming compensation. It would, thus appear that the petitioner was lulled into a state of in-action by giving her a false sense of hope of retrieving the jewellery by such representations made to her and it was in these circumstances that she refrained from initiating action under the Consumer Protection Act before the State Commission immediately after her coming to know of the incident. Such being the case, we consider that it was wrong on the part of the Bank which is a Public Sector Undertaking and thus an instrumentality of the State, to resist the petitioner's prayer for adjudication of her claim by putting forward the plea of limitation. Time and again, it has been pointed out by the Supreme Court of India that it is not proper that the Government and instrumentalities of State should seek to avoid the adjudication of a claim made against them merely on the technical plea of bar of the limitation when there has not been any manifest and deliberate latches on the part of the citizen putting forward the claim.

(3.) WE accordingly hold that the State Commission was not justified in refusing to adjudicate upon the claim put forward by the petitioner on the ground that it was time barred. The Order of the State Commission will accordingly, stand set aside and the complaint petition will stand remanded to the State Commission for disposal de-novo after adjudication on merits. The State Commission shall fix the date for appearance of parties and issue notices to them intimating them of such date.