DATE OF FILING:21/06/2012 DATE OF DISPOSAL:03/08/2012 THE DISTRICT CONSUMER DISPUTES REDRESSAL FORUM AT: SHIMOGA C.C. No.

226/2012 Dated on this the 3rd day of August 2012 PRESENT: Sri. MAHIPAL DESAI Sri. S. ASHOKA Smt. E. PREMA COMPLAINANT:Shri. Vinay B, Vivekananda Badavane, Umble Bail Road, Bommanakatte, Bhadravathi Taluk, Shimoga District. (Party in person) V/S OPPONENTS:1. Airtel authorized representative Shree venkateshwara Communication, Shivamurthy circle, Kuvempu Road, Shimoga. B.Sc.,LL.B.,(Spl) B.Sc.,LL.B., M.A.,LL.M., ..PRESIDENT MEMBER ..MEMBER

C.C.No.226/2012

2.Bharti Airtel Limited, 55, Divyasree Towers, Bannerghatta Road, Bangalore 560 029. (Ex-parte) ========= WRITTEN BY HONBLE PRESIDENT //J U D G M E N T// This is a complaint u/s 12 of the C.P.Act praying for an order against the opponents to pay Rs. 4,000/- for practicing unfair trade practice and for misleading its customers as well as public and further to pay Rs. 30,000/- for causing mental agony to the complainant and Rs. 20,000/- for deficiency in service. 2. The complaint allegations are as follows:-

3.

The complainant has taken network service connection

for his mobile since 5 years and subscribed for GPRS service. He tried to download an application from website using his phone GPRS service through torrent. It showed Access to this site has been blocked as per court orders. The complainant alleges that he called Airtel Customer Service to get clarification. They said that they blocked the website as per court order. The complainant alleges that there is no such court order. He sent E-mails making

C.C.No.226/2012

complaint about the same. But it is alleged that the opponents gave replies which were not satisfactory. Therefore the complainant alleges that there is deficiency in service on the part of the

opponents. The complainant further alleges that the opponents have tried to misinterpret the court order and blocked the website although the court order is to block a particular film clip and thus committed unfair trade practice. The complainant further contends that the act of the opponents affects the public at large and therefore this complaint may be treated as public interest litigation and impose penalty of Rs. 4,00,000/- on the opponents and use the said amount for public services concern. With the above allegations, the complainant prays for grant of the relief stated above.

4.

The statutory notices were issued by this forum to both

the opponents and inspite of due service of the notices, the opponents have not chosen to appear. Hence they are placed exparte.

5.

The complainant has filed affidavit evidence and got

marked Ex.P-1 to P-11.

6.

Heard arguments on complainant side.

C.C.No.226/2012

7.

The following points arise for our consideration. (1) (2) (3) Is there any deficiency in service on the part of the opponents? Is the complainant entitled for the relief sought? What order?

8.

Our findings on the above points are as follows:Point No.1:- Yes Point No.2 and 3 :- As per last order.

:REASONS:
9. POINT NO.1:The complainant has taken Airtel

Mobile Network Service Connection from the opponents and also has subscribed for GPRS service. The allegation is that once when he was trying to download an application from website using his cell phone GPRS service a message appeared as Access to this site has been blocked as per court orders. The complainant alleges that he called the Airtel Customer Service to get the clarification and they said that due to TRAI order the website had been blocked. The complainant cross checked and called the

customer care and they gave a different reason stating that due to Madras High Court order the website had been barred. Thereafter the complainant sent mail to get more information about the

C.C.No.226/2012

alleged ban by the court. He receive a list of band website. On its basis he further checked and he got the high court order bearing C.S.No. 208/2012 on the file of the Honble High court of Judicature at Madras. In that order of the Honble High court there is no word about banning of the website in question. Then the complainant again contacted Airtel customer care for clarification. They failed to give any solution or clarification. But they sent a mail containing the list of websites which are blocked. Thereafter the complainant called Nodal Officer and sent the court copy to him to show that the website in question was no banned according to the order of the Honble High Court of Madras. It is alleged by the complainant that even after seeing the said order the Nodal Officer gave an irresponsible and absured answer stating that there is no order by the court to no to ban the website. The complainant again called the Nodal Officer but again some irresponsible answer was there from the side of the opponents company. Therefore the complainant alleges that the opponent company has committed deficiency in service to him and has been committing Unfair Trade Practice the public in general.

10. The complainant has field affidavit in support of his complaint. In the affidavit the complainant has re-iterated the allegations made in the complaint. He has also filed documents to

C.C.No.226/2012

show that he is the subscriber for GPRS service to the opponent company and that he has made correspondence with the opponent company to get excess to the service to which he has subscribed.

The opponents inspite of due service of summons have not chosen to contest complaint. The affidavit of the complainant has gone unchallenged. On this ground alone it can be said that the deficiency in service on the part of the opponents is proved.

Besides the unchallenged affidavit evidence the complainant has filed Ex.P-9 to P-11 to show that he is a subscriber for the GPRS service being given by the opponents.

Many E-mail copies are filed and got marked by the complainant to show about illegal blocking of the website by the opponents. One document which is marked as ex.P-3(a) is important in this context. This is a letter dated: 18/6/2012 sent by the complainant to the opponent company. It appears this letter has been written by the complainant after the service customer care or Nodal Officer informed him that the blocking of the website was in accordance with the high court order. In this letter the complainant has stated that the Honble High court of Madras has not ordered to block the website. Ex.P-3(b) is the reply to the

C.C.No.226/2012

complainant by the customer care. In this letter the opponents have clearly admitted that the contention of the complainant was correct. They have stated unambiguously that they completely comprehend the view point of the complainant and sincerely apologize for any inconvenience caused to the complainant in this regard. It is needless to say that these two documents alone are sufficient to hold that the opponents have committed deficiency in service, by blocking the website illegally and that they have for sometime attempted to support their act of illegally blocking the website by misinterpreting the court order. It appears that under the above said court order only a particular film clip was prohibited downloading or uploading or copying. By misinterpreting the said order the opponent company has blocked the entire website. It is needless to say that the above act of the opponent company amounts to deficiency in service and unfair trade practice. In view of the above discussion we answer Point No.1 in the affirmative.

POINT NO.2 and 3:- The complainant prays for imposing of penalty of Rs. 4,00,000/- on the opponent as they have committed unfair trade practice treating this complainant as a public interest litigation case. This prayer of the complainant cannot be entertained in as much as this forum has no jurisdiction not try

C.C.No.226/2012

PLI. The complainant produces the order in consumer complaint NO. 83/2007 on the file of Honble NCDRC New Delhi in the case of Society of Catalyst V/s Star Plus TV and Bharti Airtel Ltd., The said decision does not rule that District Forum has jurisdiction to entertain. Moreover the complainant was a society, one of its objectives being to file public interest litigation. With various courts for individual consumers. In the instant case the

complainant is not representing any public. This is a complaint filed by him in his individual capacity. Therefore his prayer for treating this complaint as PIL cannot be entertained. Nextly the complainant prays for a decision of Rs. 30,000/- for mental agony. The affidavit and the documents filed by the complainant show that he has made lot of efforts to convince the opponents that their act of blocking the website was illegal but it was all in vain. He has made much correspondence, without any result. At the time of the argument, the complainant has submitted that the website was blocked in the last week of May 2012 and the block has been withdrawn from July 15th of 2012. That means for about more than one and half months, the illegal block was imposed. Taking into consideration the trouble taken by the complainant of making correspondence with the opponents and the irresponsibility exhibited by the opponents and also taking no fact that for more than 1 months the opponents prevented the complainant for

C.C.No.226/2012

taking the service of the website, we opine that it would be proper to order the opponents to pay Rs. 20,000/- for causing mental agony to the complainant due to the deficiency in service on their part. Further we think that it is proper to grant Rs. 2,000/- towards litigation charges.

In the result, we proceed to pass the following :-

:ORDER:
The complaint is party allowed. The opponents are directed to pay Rs. 20,000/- to the complainant for committing deficiency in service and thereby causing mental agony to the complainant. Further the opponents are directed to pay Rs.2,000/- towards litigation charges to the complainant Further the opponents are hereby ordered to comply with this order within one month from the date of communication of this order, failing which they shall pay the interest on the above

10

C.C.No.226/2012

said amount of Rs. 20,000/- at the rate of 9% p.a. till the date of the payment.
(Dictated to the stenographer transcribed typed by her, transcript corrected by us and then pronounced in open forum on this the 3rd day of August 2012).

(MAHIPAL DESAI) President.

(S. ASHOKA) Member.

(E. PREMA) Member

PL*