IMPORTANT POINT
“Consumer” – Fish rearing/fish harvesting & selling in market, not for personal use & self-consumption, amounts to commercial purpose – Complainant is not a “Consumer”.

ORDER

V.V. Seshubabu, Memeber-Judicial.—This is a complaint filed U/s.47 of the Consumer Protection Act,2019, praying this Commission as follows:

a) To direct the opposite parties to re-structure/re-establish the entire project as per the agreed DPR or an alternatively to return an amount of Rs.60,00,000/- along with 24% from the date of payment till realization, for the failure of entire project by the opposite parties No.1 to 3.

b) To award compensation of Rs.10,00,000/- for their negligence and deficiency of service and unfair trade practice.

c) Award an amount of Rs.10,00,000/- for mental agony.

d) To award crop loss amount to the tune of Rs.44,10,000/- to the complainant.

e) To award damages and for costs of Rs.50,000/- in filing the complaint, together with interest @ 24% per annum from the date of payment till realization and to pass any such other order, as the Commission deems fit and proper in the interest of justice.

2. The brief averments of the complainant are that – the Complainant wanted to set up a RAS (Recirculation Aquaculture System) which is also registered with Department of Fisheries, Telangana and was interested in doing fish farming for her livelihood; that she finalized Opposite Parties 1 to 3 towards specialized personnel to help her in the project that she engaged the services of Opposite Parties to take up the project; and to complete the installation and erection for her unit at Patancheru as per the detailed project report (DPR); that as per requirement of Opposite Parties she took the land on lease and made erection of necessary sheds as per the specifications of the Opposite Parties; that she paid a sum of Rs.60,00,000/- to the Opposite Parties till October,2021 for the project, who have also agreed to give one year free maintenance for the same and also agreed to repair the equipment and machinery by entering a separate service agreement; that the Opposite Parties not completed the works as per the standards and DPR despite several requests and even started demanding additional amounts which forced her to obtain loans from various sources.

3. The Opposite Parties completely deviated from the DPR provided by them and instead of arranging stainless steel curved bottom tank, installed PPE (Polyphelylene Ether) with flat bottom citing reason that SS tank is not available and delay will occur to supply the same, thereby convinced the Complainant that PPE tank is also would serve the needs; that as against the promise made in DPR engaged third persons to manufacture necessary equipment to be done with trained professionals thereby indulged in unfair trade practices; that promised to provide 3 stage filtration drums two in number but given only one drum with one stage filtration of 50 micron mesh drum; that failed to provide oxygen cone as mentioned in the DPR but stated that it is not required and installation of roots blower with 2HP motor would sufficient to attend the needs; that promised to provide 90 M3/HR 90,000 litres capacity MBBR but given only 8500 litres capacity MBBR, that too after mishandling the equipment during loading and unloading with JCB, that not provide equipment worth Rs.5,25,200/- and also Rs.8,16,144/- despite collection of additional amounts; that in all Opposite Parties collected Rs.60,00,000/- but erected a substandard semi-finished project; that Opposite Parties have supplied 10,000 fish saplings and they should have given very good yield in about one year, and out of them murrel variety fish (koramenu) would weigh 1+kg, but even now each fish is not more than 600 grams; that she used in the 10 months, the fish feed worth Rs.13,00,000/- @ 1300 kgs per day and also spent Rs.3 lakhs for the labour and Rs.3 lakhs for electricity; that the cost of murrel fish if weighs 1+kg it would fetch an income of Rs.450/- per kg and due to underweight of the fish the Complainant sustained a loss of Rs.44,10,000/-; that substandard equipment, inexperienced staff, not having thei