IMPORTANT POINT
An insurance contract has to be construed like any other contract on the basis of its terms and conditions and outside aid for construction of insurance policy is impermissible.

Ajit Bharihoke, Presiding Member—This revision is directed against the order of the State Commission whereby the State Commission dismissed the appeal of the petitioner opposite party against the order of the District Forum allowing the complaint.

2. Briefly put the facts relevant for the disposal of this revision petition are that respondent no.1 complainant is running a tyre retreading shop in village Tatahar in Sarkaghat Tehsil District Mandi. He insured his plant and machinery as well as the stock with the petitioner appellant for the period 06.05.2008 to 05.05.2009. The plant, machinery and accessories were insured for Rs.5.00 lacs and stocks for Rs.6.00 lacs. According to the complainant, during the validity of the insurance policy, a fire broke out in one of the two godowns of the respondent complainant located about 30 meters away from his shop. In that fire, plant, machinery and stock worth Rs.13.00 lacs were destroyed. The respondent complainant lodged an insurance claim with the appellant but it was repudiated on the ground that insurance was in respect of the plant, machinery and stocks available in the shop and the stock or the machinery kept in a godown was not insured. Aggrieved of this repudiation, respondent complainant preferred a consumer complaint seeking a direction to the petitioner to pay the insurance money alongwith compensation and litigation expenses.

3. The appellant contested the complaint and took the above noted plea of repudiation of claim.

4. Learned District Forum on consideration of the record allowed the complaint with following directions:

“In the light of above discussion, the complaint is allowed and the opposite party no.2 is directed to pay Rs.2,61,534/- to the complainant alongwith interest at the rate of 9% per annum from the date of institution of the complaint till realization. The opposite party no.2 is further directed to pay to the complainant Rs.10,000/- on account of compensation for harassment and Rs.3000/- as cost of complaint.”

5. Being aggrieved of the order of the District Forum, the petitioner preferred an appeal which was dismissed by the State Commission with following observations:

“The place, where the shop of the respondent is situated, is a small village in a remote Tehsil of Mandi District. Therefore, it can legitimately be concluded that the work of retreading tyres should be moderate. If that is so, huge stock of retreading raw material cannot be supposed to be required to be kept in the shop at any given point of time. In any case, stock worth Rs. 6.00 lacs in the form of raw material for retreading tyres cannot be even kept in a shop, where plant & machinery for retreading is also installed. So it can reasonably be presumed that what was intended to be covered by the insurance policy by way of stock, was the entire raw material for retreadig tyres kept by the respondent in the shop and stored in the godowns, though in the policy it is stated that the property is situated ‘at a shop at Thathar, Sarkaghat’. In the peculiar facts and circumstances of this case, there should be no hitch in inferring that the words “stock in the shop” used in the policy also include the stock in the godowns which are not situated far off from the shop.

In view of the above stated position, appeal is dismissed”.

6. Shri Yogesh Malhotra, Advocate, learned counsel for the petitioner has contended that impugned orders of the foras below are not sustainable as the orders are against the facts and law and based upon the assumption and presumption. Expanding on the argument, learned counsel for the petitioner has drawn our attention to the copy of insurance policy wherein name of the insured is mentioned as HGB Gopalpur A/C SSI-1589 and address is given as “Vinod Puri : Shop at Tathar PO Sarkaghat The Sarkaghat Distt : Mandi, Himachal Pradesh”. In the middle of this document, the risk is described as “Tyre Retreading Machinery and stocks” and in the coloumn below, it is mentioned