M. P. STATE CONSUMER DISPUTES REDRESSAL COMMISSION PLOT NO. 76, ARERA HILLS, BHOPAL (M.P.)

FA No. 823 / 2022.

Neeraj Verma s/o Late Shri Hiralal, R/o A-11, New Saket Nagar, Gwalior (M.P.). …. APPELLANT.

VERSUS Shri Sudhir Agrawal, Managing Director, Dainik Bhaskar Group, Head Office : Dwarka Sadan, 6, Press Complex, M.P. Nagar, Zone – I, Bhopal (M.P.). …. RESPONDENT.

BEFORE:

HON’BLE SHRI JUSTICE SHANTANU S. KEMKAR, PRESIDENT HON’BLE SHRI S. S. BANSAL, MEMBER HON’BLE DR. (SMT) MONIKA MALIK, MEMBER COUNSEL APPEARING FOR THE PARTIES :

Shri Neeraj Verma / appellant in person.

O R D E R

(Passed on 11 / 11 / 2022)

The following order of the Commission was delivered by Shantanu S. Kemkar, J :

Feeling dissatisfied with the order dated 5.9.2022 passed by the District Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission, Gwalior (for short the ‘District Commission’) in CC No.27/2022 the appellant / complainant has filed this appeal.

2. Briefly stated, the appellant / complainant had filed a complaint case against the respondent / ‘Dainik Bhaskar’ newspaper stating therein that he is consumer of the said newspaper since last 15 years and when he read the newspaper of 17.2.2021 he found that at the top of page no.5 the date has wrongly been mentioned to be 10.2.2021. According to him when he approached to the office of the respondent / Press making grievance and also submitted written complaint to it, no reply was given in regard to the said misprint regarding the date.

3. The respondent filed reply and raised an objection to the effect that the appellant / complainant will not be covered under the term ‘consumer’ as defined under Section 2 (7) of the Consumer Protection Act, 2019 (for short the ‘Act of 2019’). According to them the mistake about the date was a bonafide mistake and will not be covered under the term ‘defective goods’.

It is also alleged that the complainant has not established as to what prejudice or loss has been caused to him leading to cause of action for filing the complaint.

4. The District Commission after considering the pleadings and the evidence led by the parties found that on all the pages the date of publication has been correctly mentioned as 17.2.2021, except on page 5 where the date has been mistakenly mentioned to be 10.2.2021. The District Commission noticed that the said mistake cannot be said to have misled any consumer must less the complainant as page no.5 was part of the newspaper which is of 6 pages. The District Commission also found that neither it was a case of fake news nor it has been proved that due to misprint of date on the top of no.5 made any news to be a fake one. Having held so and having regard to the fact that no prejudice has been caused and no deficiency in service is found to be proved, it had dismissed the complaint.

5. Having gone through the aforesaid reasons stated by the District Commission and having gone through the pleadings and after considering the arguments put forth by the appellant, we are satisfied that the impugned order passed by the District Commission suffers from no infirmity and the same is based on sound appreciation of facts and law.

6. As a result, the appeal deserves to be and is hereby dismissed.

7. No order as to costs.

(Justice Shantanu Kemkar) ( S. S. Bansal ) (Dr. Monika Malik)

PRESIDENT MEMBER MEMBER