ORDER

T.S.P. Moosath, Judicial Member—Appeal No. 857/2015 is filed by the complainant and Appeal No. 454/2017 is filed by the opposite party in C.C. No. 159/2012 of the Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum, Palakkad, in short the District Forum, against the order passed by the District Forum by which the opposite party was directed to pay Rs. 1,50,000/- as compensation and Rs. 5,000/- as costs of the proceeding to the complainant.

2. The averments contained in the complaint are, in brief, as follows: The complainant entrusted the work of construction of her house building with the opposite party and for that purpose they had executed an agreement on 31.08.2009. As per the agreement the opposite party was bound to construct and handover a RCC residential house on the specification details stated in the agreement with good quality materials and as per the consideration as agreed and decided by the complainant. As per the terms of the agreement, it has been mutually agreed that the consideration for the said construction is Rs. 800/- per sq. ft. Time was the essence of the agreement and it was mutually agreed and decided also. The complainant was required to pay Rs. 7,21,200/- as the total consideration when the opposite party handed over the key of the building after its complete construction. As per the agreement the opposite party had to complete the construction of the building on or before 31.08.2010. The opposite party had undertaken the work and began to construct the house. But the opposite party has not completed the work as per the terms of the agreement and he has abandoned the construction midway without completing it on time. The complainant had paid Rs. 3,32,000/- to the opposite party by way of different occasions. The opposite party made construction up to the lintel level and walls up to half feet above the lintel level. The work done by the opposite party has a lot of defects and would be worth only Rs. 1,79,600/-. Thus, the opposite party had collected an excess amount of Rs. 1,52,400/-. The non-completion and abandoning of the house construction midway would amount to deficiency in service on the part of the opposite party. As the building is not completed within time, the complainant had to incur a loss of more than Rs. 7,00,000/-. The complainant had availed a housing loan from the LIC and she had suffered financial loss since the building was not completed within time. The prayer of the complainant is to direct the opposite party to pay compensation of Rs. 10,00,000/- and costs of the proceedings.

3. The opposite party entered appearance and filed version denying all the allegations made in the complaint. The opposite party admitted that there was a building contract between him and the complainant, but all the rest of the allegations contained in the complaint are denied. According to the opposite party the reason for non-completion of the construction of the building is due to non-co-operation of the complainant and the complainant has not effected payments as per the terms of the agreement. There is no deficiency in service on the part of the opposite party and complainant is not entitled to realize any amount from the opposite party as compensation.

4. Complainant was examined as PW1 and Exts. A1 & A2 were marked on her side. The commissioner who filed the reports was examined as CW1 and the reports filed by him were marked as Exts. C1 and C2. No oral or documentary evidence was adduced by the opposite party.

5. After considering the evidence adduced by the parties and hearing both sides the District Forum has passed the impugned order. Aggrieved by the order passed by the District Forum, the complainant has filed Appeal No. 857/2015 and the opposite party has filed Appeal No. 454/2017.

6. Since both the appeals were filed against the same order both appeals were heard and considered together.

7. Heard. Perused the records.

8. Parties are referred according to their status/rank in the complaint.

9. There i