DELHI DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY vs SUMAN SEKHRAN

Delhi Development Authority has filed this appeal against the order of Delhi State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission in the consumer complaint of Mrs. Suman Sekaran, together with her husband Chandra Sekran. Joint complaint of the Sekarans was allowed, directing Delhi Development Authority (DDA) to refund the penal interest recovered from the Complainants and to pay Rs.5000/- towards cost of litigation. A few other prayers had also been made in the complaint, but apparently no cross appeal has been filed on behalf of the Complainants. Thus, the sole issue involved in this appeal is whether penal interest on delayed payment was charged by the DDA justifiably or not. On this point, the case of the Complainants before the State Commission was:- " That the complainant is at no fault and have always been willing to pay the instalment monies at the earliest. That because of fault of the Respondent for not executing the TPA in correct format and execution of the TPA in wrong format the complainant would be liable for penal interest on delayed payment of the instalment for no fault of the complainants."

While allowing the complaint the State Commission has noted that the possession of the flat had been handed over the Complainants in 2001, after receiving from them the entire balance of amount, together with penal interest. Therefore, the State Commission held that in the interest of

justice penal interest is required to be waived due to some deficiency on the part of the OP in not releasing the Tripartite Agreement in time, which resulted into delay in arrangement of loans and payment of the balance price of Rs.1,45,000/- within the stipulated time.

We have carefully perused the records of the appeal comprising documents filed by the two sides have heard counsel for the DDA, Ms. Manika Tripathy Pandey with Mr. Ashutosh Kaushik, Advocate. On the other side, Complainant-2, Mr. Chandra Sekaran has personally argued the matter on behalf of his wife and on his own behalf. There was delay of 97 days in filing this appeal, which was condoned, subject to payment of cost of Rs.10,000/- into the Consumer Legal Aid Account and Rs.5000/- to the Complainants.

Brief facts of the case, as seen from the record, are that Sekarans had applied for allotment of flat under a Self Financing Scheme on 18.9.1996, in their joint names. As per the consumer complaint, the implication of joint application was that both, being employees of the National Insurance Company, were separately eligible for housing loan of over Rs.2 lakhs each. However, the letter of allotment which issued from the DDA showed the name of the allottee as "Mr/Ms. Suman Sekaran".

After some correspondence, the complainants received a letter dated11.9.1997 from the DDA, which stated that:- "The above letter for allocation of flat in Dwarka Cat.-II was inadvertently issued in the single name of Smt. Suman Sekaran while Smt. Sekaran applied for the allocation of flat in Joint names. Now the said letter may be treated in the name of Smt. Suman Sekaran and Shri M. Chandra Sekaran for all purposes."

While this letter resolved the issue of joint application, it also meant that their ability to apply for separate housing loans had been set back by a period nearly eight and a half months from allotment of 31.12.1996 until the clarification of 11.9.1997. Therefore, on the same day i.e. 11.9.1997 a request was made to the Appellant/DDA to extend the due date for payment as the Complainants needed to avail housing loans from the National Insurance Company Ltd, (NICL) and LIC Housing Finance Company Ltd. (LICHFCL).

This was followed by submission of the Tripartite Agreement on 25.9.1997 by the Complainants to DDA. It is specifically averred in the consumer complaint that the format for the above agreement was provided by the DDA, but two months later on 25.11.1997 they received a letter from the DDA requiring them to submit Tripartite Agreement in the correct format. The complaint petition states that the Tripartite Agreement was submitted in a format exactly similar to the one provided by the DDA. However, a fresh format was personally received by the Complainants on 28.11.1997 from Mr. G.T. Sharma of the DDA. The same was duly completed and handed over to the DDA on 8.12.1997, duly stamped and signed by the LICHFCL. The agreement was executed by the DDA on 30.3.1998. Evidently, this error in choice of the format for the Tripartite Agreement caused a further delay of about two and a half months.

In the Written Arguments filed before this commission by the respondent/complainants it is alleged that the LICHFCL had, in its letter of 25.9.1997, agreed to advance a loan of Rs.1,41,700/-, which was the only outstanding balance payable to the DDA. For this, it required the Tripartite Agreement. DDA executed the agreement but before that, it had cancelled the allotment. Eventually, the balance was paid together with Rs.1,13,526/- as interest on delayed payment and restoration charge of Rs.12,500/-. The allotment was restored and possession of the house was delivered to the complainants on 13.8.2001.

It is evident from the details above that the entire problem was caused by wrong format of the Tripartite Agreement given by DDA to the complainant. The sole explanation coming from the Written Statement of DDA before the State Commission is that "there are different formats of Tripartite Agreement. The format of the TPA is supplied to the allottee as per position explained by him to the concerned employee." Neither the Memorandum of Appeal nor the counsel for DDA have been able to add any value to this bland and vague explanation. In our view, the Complainants were very correct in their allegation that despite the knowledge of supply of wrong TPA format to them, the DDA chose to cancel the allotment itself instead of giving extension of time to get over the problem caused by wrong TPA format. We hold this to be a clear case of deficiency of service.

In the memorandum of appeal an attempt has been made to show that the delay has occurred only because the Complainants had chosen to file a fresh Tripartite Agreement. There is no explanation as to what had led to it. It is not the case of the Appellant/DDA that the Tripartite Agreement given to the Complainants in the first instance was in the right format. In that case, there would have been no justification to accept the agreement subsequently in a different format. Vague explanations have been offered. For instance para 5 of the appeal memorandum says that the TPA in revised format was signed by the Respondents on 27.2.1998, but in a feeble attempt to explain further delay that occurred, it states that the TPA was not handed over personally. There is no explanation whether this was a requirement of DDA''s rules or mere expectation of the concerned official.

In view of the above, we find ourselves in agreement with the view taken by the State Commission. We hold that in the facts and circumstances of this case, DDA did not have any justification for imposition of penal interest. Therefore, the State Commission has rightly directed refund of the same to the Complainants. The Appeal is consequently dismissed for want of merit and the order of the Delhi State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission, in complaint case No.C-38/1999 is confirmed. No costs. The statutory amount deposited by the Appellant is directed to be deposited in the Consumer Welfare Fund of the Central Government.