Delhi High Court has held that there is no provision in the Consumer Protection Act, 1986, which allows consumer courts to impose heavy penalties or punitive damages. Such courts are only permitted to order penalties of up to Rs10,000 (US$215), which should be paid to the consumer and cannot be used for other purposes.
The high court heard a petition filed by the Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI), the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) and ICICI Bank, challenging an order passed in 2006 by the Delhi State Consumer Commission in favour of a lawyer, Nivedita Sharma, with regard to unsolicited commercial communications received on her mobile phone. Categorizing this as a deficiency of services, the state consumer court imposed a penalty of Rs50 million jointly upon Airtel and COAI and a penalty of Rs25 million jointly upon ICICI Bank and American Express Bank. The consumer court also ordered compensation of Rs50,000 to be paid to the complainant.
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The update of court judgments is compiled by Bhasin & Co, Advocates, a corporate law firm based in New Delhi. The authors can be contacted at lbhasin@bhasinco.in or lbhasin@gmail.com. Readers should not act on the basis of this information without seeking professional legal advice.
