The bank acted within its authority in allowing transactions by the deceased's brother, with no sufficient evidence of fraud or deficiency in service.

ORDER

1. This is a consumer complaint by the legal heirs of late Dr. Girish Shivaji Bhate who was a medical practitioner and had earned a good fortune. He had secured his savings with the OP-1 Syndicate Bank and had invested certain amount of money in Fixed / Term Deposits and had also a Savings Bank Account No. 50052010064734 in the same Bank. The complainant no. 1 is the widow and the complainant no. 2 is the son of late Dr. Girish Shivaji Bhate. He had three brothers out of whom according to the complainants, since Dr. Bhate was not keeping well and had some health issues, he was unable to handle his accounts and other properties, therefore he had entrusted this management to one of his brothers namely Mr. Vinod Bhate. The OP-2 Mr. Rajendra Shivaji Bhate is also the real brother of Dr. Girish S. Bhate and the allegation in the complaint is that an amount of Rs. 3,40,70,140.87p which was invested in Fixed Deposit was prematurely withdrawn while he was alive and it was encashed by the OP-2 that was permitted by the OP-1 Bank without any authority to transact the premature encashment of the said Fixed Deposits. It is also the allegation of the complainant that the OP-2 Mr. Rajendra S. Bhate had no authority whatsoever to transfer the said amount to the Savings Bank Account and then to withdraw the same.

2. The contention is that the Bank acted in an irresponsible manner by allowing this transaction to be negotiated by the OP-2 which is a clear deficiency on the part of the Bank regarding the said withdrawals that were without any authority, particularly the premature encashment of the Fixed Deposits, that too even in the lifetime of Dr. Girish S. Bhate himself.

3. In order to appreciate the controversy and the facts relating to the disputed transactions it would be appropriate to extract the statement of Bank Account of the Savings Bank as referred to above which was entirely in the name of late Dr. Girish S. Bhate. The same is extracted hereinunder:

4. The entries which are relevant in the above transacted account are in relation to the term deposit receipts that were received in the account on 10.01.2011 and then its withdrawal on 12.01.2011 by the OP-2 Mr. Rajendra Shivaji Bhate as highlighted above.

5. There is one important aspect of the matter which needs to be mentioned at this stage which is that this complaint remained pending with exchange of affidavits after having been filed on 18.12.2014. Notices were issued to both the OPs and learned counsel for the OP’s have appeared and have filed their responses. The OP-2 is represented by Mr. Uday B. Wavikar and Mr. Sanjoy Kumar Ghosh, who have also appeared online and have advanced their submissions. During the pendency of the complaint, the written statements were taken on record and the W.S. of OP-2 was accepted on payment of Rs. 10,000/- as costs. Rejoinder and evidences were exchanged thereafter and the matter remained pending when the covid pandemic intervened. The matter proceeded for exchange of affidavits and pleadings thereafter. It may be pointed out that the matter had proceeded ex-parte against the Bank which order was set aside on 22.02.2022 and further time was granted for filing of written synopsis and completing the pleadings. The case was adjourned on several dates and could not be taken up for one reason or the other. The matter was ultimately taken up on 14.01.2025 when the following order was passed by the Bench hearing the matter:

Heard learned counsel for the Complainant briefly.

Essentially the matter pertains to certain transactions and withdrawals from the bankaccount of the spouse of the Complainant who was the account holder with the Opposite Party Bank by Mr. Rajendra Shivaji Bhate who is the brother of the deceased account holder.

It is the contention of