In a bid to make auto manufacturers apply brakes on claims in advertisements that their vehicle can run 70 kms a litre, a court directed automakers to keep in mind the consumers.
Compensation ordered in a consumer case against Bajaj Auto
NEW DELHI: In a bid to make auto manufacturers apply brakes on claims in advertisements that their vehicle can run 70 kms a litre, a consumer court on Thursday directed automakers to keep in mind the consumers or the area they are targeting.
“We have come across a large number of cases where false and tall claims are being made by the manufacturers as to the average of the vehicle and thereby the poor gullible consumers are prompted to purchase the vehicles but when they bring it on road, they find the average is not as claimed,” ruled the Delhi Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission chairman Justice J D Kapoor.
The commission also termed auto major Bajaj Auto’s ad claiming 70 kms a litre as “misleading and deceptive” and asked it to compensate a scooter owner who was lured into buying the vehicle due to the company’s allegedly false claims on its mileage.
“We have taken a view that whenever any (vehicle) manufacturer sells his goods by claiming an average of 70 km, it has to keep in mind the consumers or the area they are targeting,” Kapoor said.
“If they (manufacturers) know that there are no ideal conditions on the roads of Delhi or any particular region, they should not make such claims as it is misleading, alluring, deceptive and unfair,” the commission said.
Justice Kapoor also held the auto-major guilty of causing “mental agony and harassment” to a consumer Karan Pal Singh and directed it to pay Rs 15,000 as compensation for his four-stroke scooter gave him an average of 34 km a litre
compared with the company’s claims of 74 km a litre.
Singh’s appeal had sought higher compensation from the company as the district consumers forum had awarded Rs 6,250 compensation to him.
The district forum had sent Singh’s scooter to Automobile Association of Upper India (AAUI) that found its mileage to be 44 km a litre. Bajaj Auto, on the other hand, challenged contentions of Singh and AAUI stating that the scooter’s average was lower due to various factors like rush on a road and red lights.
b_rakesh@dnaindia.net
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