IMPORTANT POINT
Recruitment agency is bound to refund amount in case of refusal of job by foreign employee.

S. Chandra Mohan Nair, Member—The CDRF, Kozhikode vide its order dated 27.07.2007 has dismissed the complaint in C.C. 74/2006 and it is against the said dismissal that the complainant has come up in this appeal calling for the interference of this Commission as to the sustainability of the order passed by the Forum below.

2. The complainant’s case before the Forum was that he had taken a Pravasi Bharatiya Bima Yojana Policy on 18.04.2005 on payment of premium of Rs. 861/- in connection with his journey to Kuwait for joining a job. He had submitted before the Forum that he had been refused the job by his employer in Kuwait and his visa was cancelled. It was also submitted that he had returned to India on 09.06.2005. It is his grievance that though he had demanded an amount of Rs. 21,000/- towards one way airfare from Kuwait to Kozhikode via Delhi and

Rs. 30,000/-being the expenses, as per the policy, the claim was rejected by the opposite party and hence the complaint was filed praying for directions to the opposite party to pay the abovesaid amounts.

3. The opposite party in its version admitted that the complainant had taken the policy on 18.04.2005. But it was contended that the complainant had lost the job because of his failure to appear before his sponsor within the period specified and that it was after the long delay of 14 days that he had reported to his employer and lost the job due to his own fault and hence the opposite party was not liable to pay the amount claimed by the complainant.

4. The complainant was examined as PW1 and Exts. A1 to A5 were marked on the side of the Complainant. Though nobody was examined on the side of opposite party Exts.B1 to B8 were marked on the side of the opposite party.

5. The learned counsel for the appellant/complainant argued the case based on the submissions made in the complaint and the grounds urged in the memorandum of the present appeal. It is his very case that the Forum below had failed to appreciate Clause 4 (ii) of the policy condition and that the Forum had passed the impugned order without proper appreciation of the benefit clause. He has also submitted that the Forum ought to have followed the principle of ‘contra proferentum’ and if such an attitude was taken by the Forum there would not have been a chance of dismissal of the complaint. He has also invited our attention to clause 4(ii) of the terms and conditions of the policy marked as Ext. B1(a) and submitted before us that the complaint is to be allowed in toto.

6. On hearing the learned counsel for the appellant/complainant and also on perusing the records produced by him we find that it is the admitted case of both the parties that the opposite party had issued the policy after accepting the amount of Rs. 861/- in connection with the journey of the complainant for the job in Kuwait. It is also noted that the complainant had been refused his job in Kuwait by the employer. The opposite party would say that the complainant had appeared before his sponsor after a delay of 14 days for which reason the complainant was denied the job and his visa was cancelled. The opposite party had also argued that the complainant would not fall within any of the conditions under the benefit clause and hence they are not liable to pay any amount. But the learned counsel for the appellant has argued before us that under condition No. (ii) of benefit clause No.4 the complainant was eligible for the amount claimed. As pointed out by the learned counsel, Clause 4 (ii) reads as follows “on arrival at his work place or destination abroad, if the insured is not received by the employer (i.e there is no job/employment available or the employer refuses the job/employment)”. The learned counsel has further submitted that when there are two possible ways for appreciating the case, the Forum ought to have followed the contra proferentum rule i.e. the exclusion clause in a policy be construed in favour of the insured and against the insurer.