‘Don’t pay for item not given with car’

Consumers buying certain goods are often palmed off with certain other products, which they may or may not want, or charged for certain add-ons that they do not ask for. There are also occasions when the consumer is charged a fixed price for a product without giving him some attachments, saying they do not form part of the standard equipment supplied. Such a practice is patently unfair says the Supr-eme Court (SC) of India in the Maruti Suzuki India Ltd. vs. Rajiv Kumar Loomba case.

Loomba had purchased a Maruti car in Chandigarh and was surprised to receive a bill charging him for a ‘catalytic converter’ — an instrument which was not fitted in the said car. Loomba protested against the said charge, but the company did not give him an adequate response. He then approached the district consumer dispute redressal forum in Chandigarh, which ordered the company to refund the sum of Rs7,000 charged for the converter. The company took the matter in appeal to the state commission and the national commission in review, but both commissions dismissed the petitions as without merit. The matter then reached the SC.

In its appeal, Maruti contended that there was a directive from the Centre in 1995, wherein it was ordered that all four wheeler petrol cars in the cities of Mumbai, Delhi, Calcutta and Madras were to be fitted with a catalytic converter.

The SC observed that at the relevant time, there was no mandatory requirement for converters in vehicles in Chandigarh. Finding the complaint filed by Loomba to be justified and amounting to unfair trade practice as defined in the Consumer Protection Act, 1986, the SC dismissed the appeal and confirmed the stand taken by the consumer courts.