PUNJAB NATIONAL BANK Vs. RAMA CHAUDHARY AND ANOTHER

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THIS is an appeal against the order dated 28th April, 1993 passed by the State Commission of Delhi in Case No. C-20/91. By this order the State Commission has held that the Bank locker hired by the respondent-complainant had been tampered with after 5.4.1980 while it was in the custody of the appellant-Opposite Party, that the contents of the locker were stolen while these were in the custody of the Bank due to the negligence of the officials of the appellant-Bank. It therefore, ordered the appellant-Opposite Party to pay Rs. 1,10,460 with interest at 18% from 5.4.1988 and costs of Rs. 2,500/-.

(2.) BRIEFLY the facts are that the respondent-Opposite Party had hired a locker in the Faridabad branch of the appellant-Bank. In this locker the respondent-complainant is stated to have kept her gold ornaments and jewellery. She operated the locker on the 5th of April, 1988 before it was pilfered.

(3.) THE appellant has attacked the order of the State Commission on various grounds: That the mechanism and the system for the operation of the locker are such that a locker can be opened only jointly by the Manager who possesses the master key and by the locker holder possessing the particular locker's key and it can be closed by the locker holder himself or herself without the master key. In view of the foolproof mechanism for opening and closing the locker, there was no scope for locker being opened by anyone except the locker holder.