Ajit Karn
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Any person trusts the bank the most, whether it is to keep money with the bank, to keep precious jewelry or to take a loan by mortgaging land papers with the bank. But sometimes the bank also defaults and the papers of the mortgaged land are lost. Something similar happened with the Link Road branch of State Bank of India (SBI) Ludhiana. The papers of mortgaged land have been lost from this bank branch of SBI and now the bank will have to pay the compensation.
SBI’s appeal rejected
National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission (NCDRC) has rejected SBI’s appeal holding the bank responsible for deficiency in service and District Consumer Forum and State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission to pay compensation of Rs. Has put his stamp on the decision of On January 3, a two-member bench of NCDRC’s presiding member C. Vishwanath and member Subhash Chandra gave this decision while rejecting the appeal (revision petition) of SBI while agreeing with the decision of the District Forum and the State Commission.
The NCDRC said in the judgment that there is no doubt that the petitioner (SBI) is responsible for the loss of sale deed. He should have protected the property documents that the complainant had handed over to him (SBI). Failure to take appropriate steps to safeguard the valuable original documents of the customer is a clear deficiency in service, causing serious loss to the customer.
The NCDRC, in its decision, has referred to the Commission’s earlier judgment in SBI vs Amitesh Mazumdar, which held that the market value of the property falls due to the absence of the original title deed. No one wants to buy a property at the prevailing market price knowing that the original title deed will not be handed over to him by the seller. In that judgment, it was even said that even banks would not be willing to lend against immovable property in the absence of the original title deed.
What was the whole matter?
Jitender Pal Singh, a resident of Ludhiana, had sanctioned an advance credit limit of Rs.20,000 from the bank in 1997 for M/s Sherry Knitwear, and in lieu of this, SBI Bank’s Link Road branch, Ludhiana, had transferred Jitendra Pal Singh’s Guru Nanak Pura status in Ludhiana Civil Lines. The papers of 100 square yards of land were mortgaged. In 2010, Jitendra Pal Singh asked back the land papers from the bank after paying off all the loan in one time settlement but the paper was lost from the bank and the bank could not return the paper. After going through a lot of rounds, Jitendra Pal Singh filed a complaint against the bank in the District Consumer Forum and demanded a compensation of one lakh rupees for the trouble caused along with getting back the original papers of the land from the bank.
Accepting the complaint, the District Forum held the bank responsible for the deficiency in service and ordered the bank to pay Rs 25,000 as compensation and Rs 2,000 as litigation costs to the complainant, as well as investigate and take action against the bank officials guilty of negligence. Go The bank had earlier challenged this order in the State Commission but the State Commission had dismissed the petition after which the bank approached the National Commission.
The bank had imposed a recovery case on the complainant
The bank’s contention was that it was not responsible for the deficiency in service as it had not done anything willfully. The bank said that the complainant had availed a cash credit limit in the name of Sherry Knitwear. Later the complainant became irregular in giving the money on which the bank filed a recovery case against him. The bank said that as per the NPA account rules, SARB (Stressed Assets Resolution Branch) is transferred. Earlier SARB was called SARC.
Bank’s arguments were not accepted
The SARC had settled the account with the concerned branch, in this sequence many times the files and documents went from one department to another in which the sale deed of the property mortgaged with the bank was lost. The bank made a lot of efforts to find the documents but they could not be found. The bank will return the documents whenever they are received. But these arguments were not accepted by the NCDRC and the bank’s petition was rejected.
