ORDER (ORAL)

By this Revision Petition, under Section 21(b) of the Consumer Protection Act, 1986 (for short “the Act”), Future Generali India Life insurance Company Limited (for short “the Insurance Company”), the sole Opposite Party in the Complaint, calls in question the correctness and legality of the order dated 04.05.2017, passed by the Gujarat State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission, Ahmedabad (for short “the State Commission”) in Civil Miscellaneous Application

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No.713 of 2015.  By the impugned order, the State Commission has dismissed the Application, filed by the Insurance Company, praying for condonation of unspecified period of delay in filing of the Appeal against the order dated 18.11.2013, passed by the District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum, Surat (Additional) (for short “the District Forum”) in Complaint No.459 of 2013.  Consequently, both the Application and the Appeal have been dismissed for want of prosecution.  In arriving at the conclusion that the Appellant did not seem to be interested in prosecuting the matter, the State Commission has narrated in the order the entire sequence of the proceedings before it from time to time.  It is stated that when, on 07.08.2015, the Application and the Appeal were listed for motion hearing, while issuing notice to the Complainant/Respondent the Insurance Company was directed to pay costs of ₹2,000/-, in cash, to the Respondent and the case was adjourned to 17.04.2017.  On that date, no one appeared for the Insurance Company.  However, a prayer was made by the Complainant for providing legal aid, which was acceded to and legal aid was provided to her by the Legal Aid Committee.   Since no one was present on that date, while adjourning the matter to 04.05.2017, the State Commission imposed cost of ₹3,000/- on the Insurance Company.  On the next date, i.e., 04.05.2017, the Insurance Company still remained unrepresented.  It was also brought to the notice of the

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Bench that the amounts directed to be paid by the Insurance Company, totaling ₹5,000/-, had not been received by the Complainant.  In view of the stated factual scenario, left with no other option, the State Commission has dismissed the Application and the Appeal for non-prosecution.  Hence, the present Revision Petition.

At the outset, we may note that even before the District Forum, the Insurance Company had been proceeded against ex parte as despite service of notice at its Surat branch, the concerned Branch, the Insurance Company had not taken any steps to appear before the District Forum as well.

The short ground, on which the correctness of the order, impugned in this Revision Petition is questioned, is that the Counsel engaged initially by the Insurance Company, did not appear in the State Commission, without any intimation to the Insurance Company and therefore, another Counsel had to be engaged in the year 2016 itself to prosecute the matter.  However, the new Counsel was also handicapped in filing his vakalatnama for want of ‘No Objection’ from the earlier Counsel.

The explanation furnished for the lapse on the part of the Insurance Company in not prosecuting the matter before the State Commission as well as before the District Forum with due diligence is far from being satisfactory.  It is evident that even after the

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engagement of a new Counsel sometime in the year 2016, the Insurance Company remained unrepresented in proceedings before the State Commission.  We are unable to fathom any reason as to what prevented an authorized representative/official of the Insurance Company to appear before the State Commission and apprise it about the difficulty being faced on account of the conduct of the previous Counsel, if that was so.  Nothing has been placed on record to show the efforts made by the Insurance Company in obtaining                             “No Objection” Certificate and decision taken to replace him with a new Counsel.

In the light of the afore-noted factual scenario, coupled with the fact that the total principal amount involved in the case is a paltry sum of ₹1,25,000/-, we do not find it to be a fit case for exercise of our limited Revisional Jurisdiction, more so when we do not find any material irregularity in the decision of the State Commission in dismissing the Appeal on the afore-noted ground.

Resultantly, the Revision Petition fails and is dismissed accordingly.