Mr. Justice P.C. Misra, President—The complainant has filed this case praying for compensation for not being granted some certified copies he had applied for. His case is that a Criminal Case No. 242 of 1979 in the Court of the Executive Magistrate, Jagatsinghpur was initiated by one Hadibandhu Dalai and others against the present petitioner. The Executive Magistrate disposed of the case which was challenged by the complainant in Revision Case No. 67 of 1983 before the Hon'ble Orissa High Court. In the said criminal revision, the High Court had called for the records of the proceedings under Section 145 Cr.P.C. and the revision petition was dismissed on 7.3.1983. The complainant thereafter applied for certified copies of some of the PWs and OPWs who had deposed before the Executive Magistrate and filed a copy application for the purpose of 9.4.1991 which was registered as Copy Application No. 53 which the complainant claims to be absolutely necessary in pending O.L.R. Cases. The copies were not given to him on the plea that the records had not been received from the Hon'ble High Court for which the complainant made queries and ascertained from the High Court that the records of the said revision case had already been despatched to the Collector, Cuttack or 8.3.1993 under Memo No. 5865. Thereafter the complainant ran to the Collector, Sub-Collector and the Executive Magistrate for obtaining the certified copies of the depositions of the aforesaid witnesses, but ultimately nothing was given to him for which he has prayed for redressal had compensation of Rs. 2,25,000/-.

2. The Collector, Cuttack who is opposite party No. 1 in this case has taken some essential pleas on the basis of which it is claimed that the complainant has no case to be agitated. The plea of the Collector is that the complainant is not a consumer inasmuch as there has been no hiring of service of any of the opposite parties for consideration. His second plea is that the records after being received from the Hon'ble High Court are not traceable inspite of best efforts mostly because the clerk who was dealing with the case has since retired. It has also been stated in the show cause that efforts are still being made to trace out the necessary records for grant of certified copies and the same shall be granted as and when the records are available.

3. The learned Counsel appearing for the opposite parties strenuously contended that the aforesaid points are substantial and the complaint petition is liable to be dismissed if any one of the said points succeeds, so far as the first point is concerned, he relied on a decision of the Hon'ble Supreme Court reported in I (1996) CPJ 11 (SC)=JT 1996 (1) 71 (SC), S.P. Goel v. Collector of Stamps, Delhi in support of the submission that the complainant is not a consumer. The case which was dealt with by the Hon’ble Supreme Court in the aforesaid decision relates to registration of a Will which was executed in favour of the appellant before their Lordships. The Will being presented before the Sub- Registrar, the Sub-Registrar instead of registering the document, impounded it as he was of the opinion that it was not a Will but a Deed of Conveyance which was not duly stamped. He therefore sent the original document to the Collector of Stamps for appropriate action under Section 40 of the Stamps Act with the suggestion that the instrument was chargeable with 3% of the amount of consideration as Stamp Duty and 5% as Transfer Duty. The appellant being noticed appeared before the Collector and insisted that the document in question was a Will whereas the Collector was of the view that it was a deed of conveyance. attd was therefore required to be properly stamped and registered. The appellant however filed a complaint before the District Forum, Delhi constituted under the Consumer Protection Act and prayed for several reliefs including a direction for registration of the Will and also for supply of certified copy thereof besid