Mr. Justice K.K. Srivastava, President—After hearing Mr. R.K. Sharma, Advocate for the appellants in the two appeals bearing Nos. 261 and 262, both of 2002 filed by Punjab State Cooperative Bank Ltd. against Mrs. Devinder Cheema and Lt. Col. I.J.S. Cheema and going through the impugned order dated 23.8.2002 passed by the District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum-II, U.T., Chandigarh (for short hereinafter referred to as the District Forum), we find no infirmity in the impugned order and both the appeals are liable to be dismissed in limine. The reasons for our view are stated briefly as under :

2. The first submission made by the learned Counsel Mr. R.K. Sharma, Advocate for the appellant is that the District Forum-II wrongly held that the complaint was filed within the prescribed period of limitation whereas the complaint had been filed beyond the period of limitation of two years from the date the cause of action arose i.e. 12.6.1997, when the debit entry of Rs. 60,000/- was made in the Savings Bank Account of the respondent/complainant. The District Forum-II considered the plea of limitation in para 6 of the impugned order and held that the Savings Bank Account of the complainant was still operating and as such the cause of action to the complainant was a recurring one. The grievance of the respondent/complainant was that he was holding a Savings Bank Account with the appellant-Bank and without his knowledge and consent, the Bank debited a sum of Rs. 60,000/- from his Savings Bank Account and credited it to another Savings Bank Account No. 678. He challenged the said entry as being fraudulent and later on came to know that one Shri Bharpoor Singh, employee of the appellant - Bank had fraudulent transferred the said amount to the Savings Bank Account No. 678 and that the Bank had lodged FIR against him. Since Shri Bharpoor Singh was an employee of the appellant-Bank, hence the appellant-Bank was liable vicariously for the act/omission on the part of its employee Shri Bharpoor Singh. The contention of the learned Counsel for the appellant was that the respondent/complainant was not actively operating a Savings Bank Account since long and it was lying as a stale account. The complainant took up the matter only after knowing about the appellant-Bank against its employee Shri Bharpoor Singh and as such the cause of action had arisen only on 12.6.1997 and the same was a recurring cause of action. In our considered opinion, since the Savings Bank Account is still operational with the appellant-Bank, the wrong debit entry of a sum of Rs. 60,000/- would give a recurring cause of action to the respondent/complainant and in this view of the matter, the findings recorded by the District Forum-II cannot be said to be contrary to the material placed on record. The complaint had been initially entertained by the District Forum-II and it was only after the appellant-Bank appeared as O.P. and filed written statement that the plea of limitation was considered. The respondent/complainant had filed his affidavit showing knowledge of the debit entry some times in 1998 and that knowledge of the respondent/complainant could not be demonstrated by the learned Counsel for the appellant to be factually incorrect.

3. Consequently, we uphold the finding of the District Forum-II that the complaint was filed within the prescribed period of limitation of two years under Section 24A of the Consumer Protection Act, 1986.

4. The other plea which had been raised by the appellant-Bank before the District Forum-II was that there was a collusion between the complainant and Shri Bharpoor Singh in defrauding the Bank. Shri Bharpoor Singh was the former Manager of the Bank and a plea was also raised that Shri Bharpoor Singh was a necessary party to the complaint case. The District Forum-II while considering the case of collusion between the complainant and Shri Bharpoor Singh recorded a categorical finding that there was no reliable evidence led by the appellan