NEIGHBOURHOOD

5 get life term for murder
Suman Bhatnagar

Chandigarh, May 24
While the UT Administration had planned to start a drive to remove 180 mobile towers in the residential areas from Friday, the Supreme Court today ordered to maintain the status quo.

The decision was taken by the apex court bench of Justice Deepak Verma and Justice SJ Mukhopadhaya on a petition by Vodafone South Ltd challenging the Punjab and Haryana High Court order directing the removal of 180 mobile towers from the residential areas. The court also issued notices to the central government and the Chandigarh administration. The Punjab and Haryana High Court, on May 14 and 22, had directed the UT Administration to remove mobile towers.

The counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioners told the court that the high court order for removing the mobile phone towers would not only affect the operations of Vodafone and other service providers but would also cause grave inconvenience to the public.

The counsel further argued that the no policy with respect to the mobile phone towers in residential areas had been finalised by the Chandigarh administration.

Earlier today in the afternoon, the UT Administration had decided to remove all 180 towers from the residential areas. The UT Admn had constituted special teams of the Estate Office, Chandigarh Housing Board (CHB), Municipal Corporation (MC) and Electricity department employees to start the drive from Friday. The Administration had decided that that initially they would disconnect power supply to all these mobile towers.

The draft policy on mobile phone towers, which was prepared in 2004, makes it clear that no such tower would be allowed in residential areas and would be constructed only on commercial buildings which had completion certificates and sanctioned building plans. The policy further reads that the commercial buildings should have sewerage connections and should be inspected by the Estate Office staff.

The policy could not be notified since the court had stayed it. The litigation was sent to the SC and was subsequently reverted to the High Court.

Panchkula, May 24
Upholding the decision of the District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum-II, the State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission has directed HDFC Bank to pay a compensation of Rs 20,000 to a Sector-46 resident.

The state commission comprising president Justice Sham Sunder and members Neena Sandhu observed, “The act of the opposite parties in issuing the policy without any proposal form and thereafter debiting the credit card account of the complainant amounted to deficiency. Hence, we are of the considered opinion that the order passed by the district forum, does not suffer from any illegality or perversity, warranting the interference of this commission. The appeal, being devoid of merit, must fail, and the same is dismissed."

The HDFC Bank had filed an appeal against the district forum, which directed the bank to withdraw all illegal demands raised against the complainant; issue a fresh visa woman’s god credit card statement against card number 4346-7811-0158-0553 showing the opening balance as Rs 59.03, pay a compensation of Rs 20,000, besides Rs 7,000 as costs of litigation.

The complainant, Satnam Kaur, a resident of Sector 46, had averred that she was having an account with the bank in Phase VII, Mohali, and she wanted to shift that account to the Sector-46 branch in Chandigarh, as the Mohali branch was far away from her house. However, instead of shifting the said account, the complainant had opened a new account, with its branch in Chandigarh. It was stated that she was also having a credit card issued by the bank. She received a letter on August 26, 2010, issued by HDFC Bank Limited, (opposite party number 1) showing that a sum of Rs 8,841 was debited to her credit card account, as premium, for an insurance policy issued by HDFC ERGO General Insurance Company Limited (opposite party number 2). She had not filled in the proposal form and, therefore, the issuance of policy, in her name, and debiting her credit card account against the premium of the said policy, amounted to deficiency in service and unfair trade practice. However, no action was taken and instead the opposite party number 1 demanded Rs 13,582.52 on account of premium amount, along with late charges, penalties, etc.

The counsel for the opposite party number 1, submitted that the policy was issued by the opposite party number 2, which was totally a separate office, through its own agent or through telephone banking/credit card division.

The opposite party number 2 averred that the policy was extended to the complainant, after a request was lodged by the opposite party number 1/bank, on her behalf.