Activate Promised Number or Pay Rs 50000, DK Consumer Forum Tells Airtel
Mangaluru: In a clear victory for an aggrieved consumer, Dakshina Kannada District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum has decreed that mobile service provider Airtel is guilty of deficiency in service and ordered the company to pay compensatory amounts to the complainant.
In the year 2013, Abdullah A Rehman, a city-based youth had placed a confirmed order with Airtel Relationship Centre, Paradigm Plaza, AB Shetty Circle, Mangaluru for a SIM card with a specific cell phone number and paid Rs 1750 towards the purchase. After some time the company contacted Abdullah A Rehman and informed him that the number paid for is a fancy number and demanded a premium of Rs 25000/- from him. When Abdullah Rehman refused to pay the extra amount demanded and insisted that they activate the number already paid for, Airtel went ahead and sold the number to some other customer in Delhi for Rs 25000.
Hence Abdullah decided to seek legal remedy and Dakshina Kannada District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum accepted his complaint on 4th April 2013. After listening to both parties, Additional Bench of the Forum presided by Vishweshwara Bhat D with T C Rajashekar as member found that the service provider was at fault. In its order dated 3rd December 2016, the bench decreed Airtel company to either re-allot and activate the number paid for or alternatively pay Rs 25000 with 9% interest from the date of the complaint. It also ordered payment of Rs 20000 as compensation for mental agony and hardship and Rs 5000 towards litigation costs within 30 days of receiving the order.
Abdullah who received his copy of the order only a few days back is jubilant about his victory. “Often times corporates riding high on their power assume that they can get away with their flaws by framing several tiresome procedures. It’s unfair they take such matters mildly. Today I am glad that through this order, justice is delivered and rekindled the hope in the common man towards our judiciary,” he says.