Satish Kumar vs Executive Engineer, Uhvpnl & Anr

V.K.Jain, Presiding Member

This revision petition is directed against the order of the State Commission dated 23.06.2011 whereby an appeal preferred by the respondents against the order of the District Forum was allowed in the absence of the petitioner/complainant.

The case of the petitioner/complainant is that the notice of the appeal instituted by the respondent was never served upon him and therefore, he had no opportunity to appear before the State Commission and contest the appeal instituted by the respondents.

The learned counsel for the petitioner has drawn my attention to a miscellaneous order of the State Commission dated 18.04.2011 which reads as under:

Perusal of the file shows that notice was sent to the respondent under office dispatch No.697 dated 25.1.2011 on the given address. However, neither it has been received back served or unserved. A period of 30 days has already been expired it is presumed that respondent has been served. No one has put appearance on behalf of the respondent despite of repeated calls since morning. Hence respondent is proceeded exparte. Now to come up on 23.6.2011 for arguments.

It would thus be seen that the notice of the appeal was never actually served upon the petitioner/complainant and he was declared to have been served only because the envelope in which the notice was sent to him by the State Commission, was not received back.

Though the law does permit declaration of service when a notice sent by Registered Post is not received back either served or unserved and a period of more than 30 days from the dispatch has expired, but the fact remains that there is always a possibility of an unserved envelope being lost/misplaced either by the Postman/Post Office in transit or even in the Court/Forum by which the said envelope containing the notice was sent. When the service declared in such a manner is denied on oath, there is no reason to disbelieve the statement made on oath.

The petitioner has maintained that the notice of the appeal was never tendered to him. The revision petition is supported by his affidavit. I therefore, see no reason to disbelieve the averment made by him. The petitioner, being a consumer, his natural inclination would be to contest the appeal when a favourable order has already been secured by him. Therefore, the impugned order is set aside and the appeal instituted by the respondents is remitted back to the State Commission to decide the same afresh on merits after hearing both the parties including the petitioner before this Commission. The parties are directed to appear before the State Commission on 20.02.2020. The Revision Petition stands disposed of and considering the age of the case, the State Commission shall decide the appeal afresh within three months of the parties appearing before it.