Mr. M.B. Shah, President—The insurance company has preferred this appeal against the judgment and order dated 7.11.2003 in C.D. No. 76 of 2000 passed by the Andhra Pradesh State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission. By the impugned order, the State Commission has directed the insurance company to pay compensation of Rs. 15,68,670/- along with interest @ 12% from the date of filing of the complaint till payment on the basis of Surveyor's report.

2. The claim of the complainant was repudiated by the insurance company of the basis of the investigation report submitted by Mr. N.V. Subba Reddy on 23.12.1999. The relevant conclusions in the said report are as under:

(1) The insured had taken the Policy of Rs. 25.00 lakhs covering different items and listing to 7 individual articles. He had claimed for the entire 7 articles, even through the Tripod (2 Nos) only 14" CTV is not all damaged, even as per the police version, Surveyor's version and the version of Station Fire Officer. Then the claim for these two items viz. Tripod (2 Nos.) and 14" CTV is undoubtedly fraudulent.

(2) The insured had stated through the claim form that all these insured items were imported from Global Infoware, U.S.A. which is proved incorrect as revealed in this investigation. Thus his version that these items were purchased from Global Infoware had remained false and fictitious. Equally fictitious are the invoices of thus no credence need be given to these invoices and rates charged thereon.

(3) It is revealed, as per the photos taken and the cassette produced, that there were some damages to the articles in the insured unit. In the absence of correct purchase invoices being produced for these insured articles by inured, the cost of the articles as seen damaged in the photos and cassettes cannot be worked out. The police Punchanama which contained some description cannot be relied upon, as discussed in the concerned chapter. From the photos and cassette made available, it is impossible to identify that the insured articles and damaged articles were the same. In view of the fraudulent conduct of the insured as observed in this investigation, the possibility of some other useless or less costlier articles being brought and damaged cannot be overruled, inasmuch as the insured himself was indulged in this fire occurrence. Any second hand stuff could be procured at Hyderabad at very cheap rate. The evidence produced by the insured of his hiring the camera to outsiders, will in no way confirm, that the material rent out is the same that is damaged. It could be different.

(4) The forcible entry inside was not all established. But there was fire occurrence, and in such situation the only inference will be that the fire occurrence had taken place due to the indulgence the inside inmates and not outsiders. This clearly establish that the fire occurrence was pre-planned and evidence noticed from the wall clock. It cannot be imagined that the insured would have burnt articles really worth Rs. 25.00 lakhs and inform the Police (through his complaint) that the damages were to an extent of Rs. 15.00 lakhs and inform the Station Fire Officer, that the extent of losses were to a tune of Rs. 20,01,000.00 and claim entire Rs. 25.00 lakhs through his claim form later. What is this drama? What were the exact losses? How much compensation he expected from the insurers? This clearly show that the extent of damages was not actual, and whatever he got was a big fortune to him.

(5) The police Panchnama and Fire Attendance Certificates were not reliable as discussed in this report. Because the claim was false, he was quite apprehensive and did not cooperate with the investigator in this inquiry. He remained quite evasive and non-cooperate.

(6) The quotation obtained from New Video Limited, Chennai was obtained by the insured. Further, the rates as quoted in this quotation, compared to the invoices of Global Infoware, vary to a considerable degree and thus not reliable.

The inquiries c