JEHANABAD GAS AGENCY Vs. SANJAY KUMAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an appeal against the order dated 15th March, 1991 passed by the District Forum, Jehanabad in Consumer Case No.3 of 1991, whereby the appellant have been directed to pay Rs.500/- as compensation to the complainant (respondent before us) for the harassment and losses which he suffered on account of non supply of the refill of the LPG for which he was a duly registered bonafide customer. The facts of the case in very brief is that the complainant booked a refill for his gas cylinder on 13.11.90 and when no gas was supplied till 23.12.90, he enquired about the non supply of the refill of his gas cylinder from the shop of the. O. P. (appellant before us) and the persons present in the shop very cruel y behaved with the. complainant and informed that all refills booked till 14.11.90 have been supplied. The complainant told them that he had booked on 13.11.90 and still there was no supply. T he complainant made another booking on 3.1.91 and the refill of the gas was supplied to him on 4.1.91. The appellant has denied these allegations of the complainant. They affirm that the refill of the gas cylinder was supplied to the complainant on 21.11.90 against the booking made by him on 13.11.90. The appellant also avers that 23.12.90 was a Sunday on which day the shop remains closed and, therefore, no enquiry could have been made from them on that date as alleged by the complainant. The appellant also submits that there was shortage of supply of gas cylinders at that time and therefore, the Supply Department issued instructions not to book refills of the gas cylinder before the expiry of 21 days after the previous supply of such a refill. We have perused the records of the lower court and heard the learned lawyers of both the parties.

(2.) Admittedly the complainant (respondent) booked for a refill of his gas cylinder on 13.11.90. The appellant state that against this booking, gas was supplied to the complainant (Customer No.1131 on 21.12.90 vide Receipt No.14503 ). It is also stated that the gas was supplied at the residence of the customer and the name of the vendor was Ram Parawesh Rai. The complainant (respondent) in this connection has affirmed that no gas was supplied on that date and no body could have signed the receipt because he was in Court, his son was in school and his wife is illiterate. The learned District Forum have pointed out in their order that the customer card of the complainant was initialled by the President of the District Forum. The appellant in their memo of appeal vide Para 6 at page 5 and Paragraph TV on the grounds have said that the District Forum committed serious error by returning the customer card to the complainant and this casts a serious doubt on the conduct of the learned District Forum. We fail to see as to what error was committed by the learned District Forum by returning the initialed customer card to the complainant. The appellant himself admits that the customer card is a card of which the customer is a custodian. Moreover he has also admitted that (vide Para 7 of the memo of appeal) copy of the card is maintained by him also. In that situation what prevented him from getting his copy also initialled by the District Forum is any body's guess.

(3.) The main issue, as we have already pointed above, is whether the refill was supplied to the complainant on 21st of December, 1990 against the booking on 13.12.90. The complainant denies the supply and assets that no body could have signed the receipt, as the only female member then available in the house was his wife, who is illiterate. The learned District Forum also found cuttings etc. in the daily Refill order register of the appellant dated 21.12.90. These cuttings were tried to be explained before us that the two names had been left out and to incorporate these names cuttings had to be made. We fail to appreciate this justification for the cuttings made in the register. If there were omissions as lodged according to the appellant necessitating the cuttings, why could these not have been made below the last entry since all the entries relate to one date i. e. ; 21.12.90. In that case all that could have happened was that the serial number of Cash memos would not have shown a continuous numbering and the number of the customer whose names were omitted would have been written after the last entry.