Frivolous petitioner told to pay up

CHENNAI: Strongly condemning frivolous petitions, the State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission has fined a Perambur-based businessman Rs 25,000 for re-sending a previously withdrawn petition that alleged corruption among the consumer commission members.The petitioner, VR Krishnakumar, had filed a petition with the State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission in 2006 seeking compensation of Rs 2 crore from American Express bank for causing him loss of business by not extending a Letter of Credit to sanction credit facilities for his current account. This, despite his requests made to the bank for the same, he alleged. Krishnakumar’s case had already been dismissed by the Banking Ombudsman, while efforts to take the issue to the Director General of Foreign Trade, Central Vigilance Commission and Directorate of Revenue Intelligence, Chennai, had all proved futile.In its order in November 2008, the commission dismissed the complaint. Kumar filed another petition, alleging that the members who dismissed his complaint had been collecting bribe for over two years and repeatedly granted adjournments without recording them in the court record docket. When this case was posted before the commission for maintainability because the opposite parties in the petition - the commission members - enjoyed protection from their official duties, Krishnakumar endorsed withdrawal of his complaint. Following this, the said complaint SR No 989/2009 was rejected.  And yet, he then filed the same petition with the state consumer disputes redressal commission in another typeset, alleging corruption on the part of the commission members. When the case was brought up again, Krishnakumar did not appear at all. It was then that the president of the commission M Thanikachalam fined the petitioner Rs 25,000. In a strongly-worded order, M Thanikachalam has stated that such “mudslinging upon the opposite parties, ….. most frivolous vexatious unwarranted case on earth, should be rejected with cost” and ordered the fine to be paid within 10 days.  The president, in his order, also noted that the petitioner did not opt for an appeal when his first petition was dismissed, to question the correctness of the finding of the members.  A source in the commission confirmed that the petitioner made the fine payment.