The Orbit Motors Pvt ltd, a Maruti car dealer, was convicted in a consumer harassment case and fined Rs 50,000 by the District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum, Sundargarh-II, Rourkela recently.
The dealer had sold ordinary accessories in the name of branded company and charged extra price from a customer.
According to the source, Akshaya Kumar Das, a staff of NITR, had purchased a Maruti Swift Dzire ZDI Car from the Orbit Motors on March 23, 2015. Besides paying the cost of the car, he had paid additional Rs 28,170 towards accessories of a branded company. The company had given him a hand written receipt with a condition that the computerised bill would be sent in his address later.
But after a few days, some odd sound was heard from left side of the bumper and subsequently the front bumper was broken. Das lodged a complaint with the company on April 21, 2015 demanding for the computer bill. He received a computorsised bill on February 15, 2016, which mismatched the hand bill. The computerised bill showed a purchase of Rs 21,920, which was Rs 6,250 less than the hand bill. Hence, he demanded for refund of the extra amount.
As his grievance was not nattended, Das filed a case in the District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum on March 11, 2016. After hearing the case, the court directed the Orbit Motors and the Maruti Suzuki India ltd to replace all defecting accessories with new ones, refund the extra mount of Rs 6,250 with interest at 6 per cent per annum from the date of purchase and conduct fuel test of the car free of cost within 15 days.
Further, the forum directed to pay a sum of Rs 50,000 as compensation to Das for mental agony and harassment meted out to him and Rs 10,000 towards costs. All the directions should be complied within a month, directed the court. lawyer Arjun Charan Maharana and Bijay Kumar Pattnaik fight the case for Das.