Mr. Ram Lal Gupta, Member—The issuance of fake foreign currency by Punjab National Bank; use thereof in good faith by the complainants abroad; subsequent detection of the same by the authorities abroad; concommitant humiliation of the 'consumers' and later on, realising the currency to be fake; issuance of the genuine currency instead and the action taken under the Consumer Protection Act, 1986, in short, is the subject matter of the present complaint.

2. Complainant-1 H.R. Darvesh is the husband of Sm. Shil Darvesh and father of Rajan Sharma, complainants-2 and 3 respectively. The facts constituting the fabric of the complaint, as depicted therein are summarised as under:—

Complainant-1, as an Executive Director, is managing and controlling the entire business and affairs of Mukerian Paper Mills Ltd., Hoshiarpur. He claims to be an expert in pulp and paper milling. By dint of devotion and hardwork, he has turned many sick units into profit-earning industries. He is the winner of many National and International Awards in this respect. He was selected from the whole of India and from Non-Resident Indians throughout the world, by the International Friendship Society of India based at Bangkok (Thailand) for the awand of "Pride of India Gold Award" which he was to receive on 10-10-1992. He made a programme to carry his wife and younger son complainants-2 and 3 respectively with him for seeing the ceremony and also for sight-seeing. They applied for 1,000 dollars under Foreign Travellers Scheme (FTS). Complainant-1 had also to go to England for attending a technical conference later on. Therefore, he applied for 500 dollars against complainants-2 and 3 each, totalling 1,000 dollars. Respondent-2 took Rs. 30,500/- for issuing ten currency bills of 100 dollars each vide Bank's receipts Annexure Al. From Delhi International Airport on 9-10-1992 they took 20 dollars against each passport. On reaching Bangkok Airport, for taking visa, the went to a counter for getting exchanged the dollars issued by the respondent-Bank into Bahts. They were apprised that all the ten bills were fake. Being in a' difficult position, they had to pay the Airport Authorities towards visa charges, the dollars which they had received at the Delhi Airport. They in disturbed mind managed to proceed to Hotel Hilton, Bangkok in a taxi. There they met Gurmit Singh of Delhi, who was associated with the Award giving agency. With his help at the hotel, they were able to get 100 dollars exchanged for Bahts against the signatures of complainant-1, giving duplicate slip to them. They also got exchanged 400 dollars for Bahts. They sajourned at Singapore for about a week. However, throughout this stay, they were always having a fear in their minds that the dollar bills accepted by the hotel might turn out to be fake and they might not be in some trouble for carrying counterfeit currency. Then they had to visit Singapore for a business purpose where they faced the same difficulty of exchange of currency. For exchange, complainant-1 contacted one of the money-changers. He offered three bills of 100 dollars each to the money changer. The money-changer seemed to have detected the dollars to be fake and they had to retreat, leaving the dollars with him. Remaining dollars they were able to utilise. Hard pressed for money, there they had to dispose of their customary and valuable belongings that they had received from their kith and kin on various ceremonies in India to meet the daily expenses for stay at Singapore. Ultimately, they had to come back to Delhi Airport after suffering the ordeal of six days's trip. As a result of this sad experience, complainant-2 fell ill seriously. She was given medical treatment at New Delhi Airport and subsequently at Mukerian for about 1½ months. Preparation of complainant3 for pre-medical entrance test also suffered, as he could not study for about a month due to shock of foreign tour. On 18-10-92 the Agency that gave him the award, sent a