Consumer Rights

Delhi University cut-off list -the first list, released on June 25, 2009

ashish — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 19:40:04 +0000

The first cut-off list for Admissions to 2009 Under-Graduate course have been released, and here are links to the list:

Admission lists for SC/ST/PH candidates at the following location (link to list page)

Dates for collection of admission slips, and for depositing fees:

Collection of Admission Slip from Arts faculty (North Campus) 25th, 26th, 27th and 29th of June 2009 between 10 AM to 1PM (Excluding Sunday)

Payment of fees in the college : 26th, 27th and 29th of June 2009

A website catering to Delhi University (DUspecial.in)

St. Stephen’s first cut-off list, 2009

ashish — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 20:21:18 +0000

St. Stephens is one of the most reputed colleges in India, located in Delhi University’s North Campus.

Address:
St. Stephen’s College, University Enclave, Delhi - 110007
India
Phone:
+91-11 2766 7271
Fax :
+91-11 2766 7965 Residence Blocks
+91-11
Allnutt North: 27666460
Allnutt South: 27666414
Mukarji East: 27666421
Mukarji West: 27666416
Rudra North: 27666513
Rudra South: 27666425

Details of admissions are on this page; http://www.ststephens.edu/admissions.htm

Interview list (link)

Cut off’s. The list was released on the 17th of June, 2009.

Cut-offs (2009)

The following is the minimum eligibility requirement for being called for interview for admission to the following courses, subject to meeting other applicable eligibility requirements:-

Subject	Minimum Eligibility Requirement for Interviews
Subject	Stream	General
Sanskrit (Hons.)	All	63 % BFS
Economics (Hons.) (80% in Maths for the General Candidates)	Science	95.75 % BFS
	Commerce	97 % BFS
	Humanities	95 % BFS
History (Hons.)	Science	95 % BFS
	Commerce	97 % BFS
	Humanities	91 % BFS
English (Hons.) 80% in Elective English OR 90% in Core English for General Category. (For all streams)	Science	96 % BFS
	Commerce	97 % BFS
	Humanities	92.5 % BFS
Philosophy (Hons.)	Science	84 % BFS
	Commerce	96 % BFS
	Humanities	85 % BFS
B.A. Programme	Science	94 % BFS
	Commerce	96 % BFS
	Humanities	88 % BFS
Mathematics (Hons.) (Include Maths & at least One Language in BFS. Students who have done Business Math’s are not eligible.)	Science	94.5 % BFS
	Commerce	94 % BFS
	Humanities	82 % BFS
Physics (Hons.)	Science	94.33 % PCM
Chemistry (Hons.)	Science	92.33 % PCM
B.Sc. Programme (Physical Sciences) with Computer Science	Science	93.33 % PCM (C - Chemistry/ Computer Science)
B.Sc. Programme (Physical Sciences) with Chemistry	Science	89 % PCM (C - Chemistry)
Note: Candidates belonging to reserved categories click here to see their respective cutoffs. “BFS” stands for “Best of Four Subjects” with one language. “PCM” stands for Physics, Chemistry and Mathematics.

List of colleges that are part of Delhi University

ashish — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 19:55:28 +0000

There are a total of 83 such colleges, and this list is not supposed to include private colleges, so if you see a college stating that it is part of Delhi University, this list is a good reference point. The naming of this list is alphabetical, and is not an indicator of the ranking of the college.

1. Acharya Narendra Dev College
2. Aditi Mahavidyalaya
3. Ahilyabai College of Nursing
4. Amar Jyoti Institute of Physiotherapy
5. Atma Ram Sanatan Dharma College
6. Ayurvedic & Unani Tibbia College
7. Bhagini Nivedita College
8. Bharati College
9. Bhaskaracharya College of Applied Sciences
10. Bhim Rao Ambedkar College
11. College of Arts
12. College of Vocational Studies
13. Daulat Ram College
14. Deen Dayal Upadhyaya College
15. Delhi College of Arts & Commerce
16. Delhi College of Engineering
17. Delhi Institute of Pharmaceutical Sci & Research
18. Deshbandhu College
19. Deshbandhu College (Evening)
20. Durgabai Deshmukh College of Special Education (Visual Impairment)
21. Dyal Singh College
22. Dyal Singh College (Evening)
23. Gargi College
24. Hans Raj College
25. Hindu College
26. Indira Gandhi Instt.of Phy. Edu. & Sports Sciences
27. Indraprastha College for Women
28. Institute of Home Economics
29. Janki Devi Memorial College
30. Jesus & Mary College
31. Kalindi College
32. Kamla Nehru College
33. Keshav Mahavidyalaya
34. Kirori Mal College
35. Lady Harding Medical College
36. Lady Irwin College
37. Lady Shri Ram College for Women
38. Lakshmi Bai College
39. Maharaja Agrasen College
40. Maharishi Valmiki College of Education
41. Maitreyi College
42. Mata Sundri College for Women
43. Maulana Azad Medical College
44. Miranda House College
45. Moti Lal Nehru College
46. Moti Lal Nehru College (Evening)
47. Nehru Homeopathic College
48. Netaji Subhas Institute of Technology
49. P.G.D.A.V. College
50. P.G.D.A.V. College (Evening)
51. Pt. Deen Dayal Institute - Physically Handicapped
52. Rajdhani College
53. Rajkumari Amrit Kaur College of Nursing
54. Ram Lal Anand College
55. Ram Lal Anand College (Evening)
56. Ramjas College
57. Satyawati College
58. Satyawati College (Evening)
59. School of Open Learning
60. School of Rehabilitation Sciences
61. Shaheed Bhagat Singh College
62. Shaheed Bhagat Singh College (Evening)
63. Shaheed Rajguru College of App.Sci. for Women
64. Shaheed Sukhdev College of Business Studies
65. Sherubtse College
66. Shivaji College
67. Shri Ram College of Commerce
68. Shyam Lal College
69. Shyam Lal College (Evening)
70. Shyama Prasad Mukherjee College
71. Sri Aurbindo College
72. Sri Aurbindo College (Evening)
73. Sri Guru Gobind Singh College of Commerce
74. Sri Guru Nanak Dev Khalsa College
75. Sri Guru Tegh Bahadur Khalsa College
76. Sri Venkateswara College
77. St. Stephen’s College
78. Swami Shraddhanand College
79. University College of Med. Sc. And G.T.B. Hospital
80. Vallabhbhai Patel Chest Institute
81. Vivekanand College
82. Zakir Husain College
83. Zakir Husain College (Evening)

Man gets succour from Delhi High Court after hand gets crushed

ashish — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 12:08:14 +0000

One reads in the newspaper all the time about some accident whereby a person gets injured due to rash or negligent driving by the driver of a vehicle (in numerous cases, this rash driving would be done by the driver of a bus or truck, and because of the size and weight of this large vehicle, the injuries would be serious, or even death could occur). In such cases, a person (or his dependents) can claim compensation from either the driver / owner of the vehicle, or from the insurance company that had provided insurance to the vehicle. Such claims need to be filed under the Motor Accident Claim Tribunal, which assesses the loss of employment income along with extent of injury and accordingly provides compensation (some compensation is also provided in the cases where the fault of the driver cannot be proved). These cases can also be taken to higher courts if either party is unsatisfied with the award of the Tribunal (link to article):

NEW DELHI: The Delhi High Court has awarded over Rs five lakh as compensation to a man whose right hand was crushed after it came under the rear wheel of a bus in an accident five years ago. Justice J R Midha enhanced the compensation from Rs 2.43 to Rs 5.76 lakh considering the medical reports which suggested that the self-employed victim had suffered 50% disability.
The Motor Accident Claim Tribunal after assesing the claim had awarded Rs 2.43 lakh to Tahir, who was earlier doing screen printing job, to compensate for loss of income. The High Court allowed Tahir’s appeal for enhancement of compensation after taking into account medical certificates which claimed that he suffered permanent disability rendering him unemployed. HC in its order, also directed that the amount be deposited in a bank as fixed deposit.

Not too many people are aware of some of the processes and procedures dealing with applying for compensation under the Motor Accident Claim Tribunal, so here are some sites that provide more information on this area:

What is Motor Accident Claim Tribunal (link to article):

Who can report to MACT in case of accident ?
Victim himself or through Advocate,in the case of personal injury. Through advocate in case of minor applicant below the age of 18 years. Legal heirs themselves or through advocate in the case of death.The owner of the vehicle in the case of property damage.

Some queries related to the MACT (link to article, including the documents to be submitted):

Q. I had lodged a case for insurance on account of motor accident, which took place. The Tribunal held that the liability of the Insurance Company is limited to Rs. 20000/- only. Whether Tribunal is right in saying so and what is my remedy against said order?
A. If there is no evidence on the record to show that the liability of the Insurance Company was limited to Rs. 20,000/-, the finding of the Tribunal is liable to be set aside. The liability of an Insurance company, unless there is a prohibition to same in a contract or otherwise, is unlimited You can challenge the said order before the High Court in appeal.

More details on applying to MACT (link to article):

Chapter 10 with Sections 140 to 144 provides for interim compensation on ‘No Fault’ Basis. According to this provision Rs. 50,000/- is to be given to the kith and kin of the deceased and Rs. 25,000/- to the grievously injured victim. The compensation under Section 140 is made payable if prima facie evidence of following is available;
(1) Accident by the offending vehicle;
(2) Offending vehicle being insured;
(3) Death or grievous injuries have been caused.

DDA fined Rs. 50,000 for delay in giving possession of a flat

ashish — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 11:33:19 +0000

The Delhi Development Authority had developed a huge number of flats in the Indian capital, and settled large sections of the capital (as per its mandate). However, experiences of people vary in terms of the customer-friendly nature of the Authority. For example, the Authority has been known to delay in handing over properties, land, and is famed for the level of corruption. Raids on its officers have always managed to net people involved in corruption, and it is common knowledge that getting a file to move in the DDA headquarters is a fairly difficult task. So, it is not uncommon to hear of people, even though they have been allotted a flat by the DDA, facing huge amounts of problems in actually getting the paperwork and physical allocation. It is to solve such problems that people are increasingly taking the help of instruments such as consumer forums and courts, and these institutions are indeed helping out people (link to article):

NEW DELHI: The National Consumer Commission has held the DDA guilty of causing mental agony to a woman who was not handed over possession of a flat for nine years and asked it to pay Rs 50,000 as compensation. The Commission, comprising Justice R C Jain and member Anupam Dasgupta, also asked the housing agency to pay interest to allottee Prabhati at the rate of 15% on Rs 8.59 lakh for the period between 1998 to 2005.
“In the facts and circumstances of the case, we hold that the delays in issuing the letter of possession of the flat and in delivering its possession are instances of gross misfeasance in the DDA,” the Commission said, adding that it was an “inexplicable and deliberate” delay by the authority. The panel passed the order on DDA’s plea challenging the Delhi Consumer Commission’s direction to it, asking the agency to pay the allottee Rs 50,000 compensation and Rs 2,500 cost.

This is not the first time such a judgment has been passed on the DDA, which has been held guilty in many previous such cases of causing agony to people who have been successful in winning flats, and then being forced to wait for long periods before getting possession. And yet a systematic cleanup of the DDA does not seem like a possibility, given the vested interests involved.

Telecom: Reliance Commnications fined Rs. 10,000 for being deficient in services

ashish — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 13:16:53 +0000

Getting an internet connection in modern India should be very easy, and it should almost be like a commodity. The customer pays for a connection, and the company provides the connection, and it works with minimum down time. But what do you when the company provides you with a connection that is old, even though you asked for a 1 year connection ? And how do you get to know ? Well, the connection ends and you are told to pay up for the unpaid bills. Furthermore, officials of the company do not treat the customer with due convenience, and instead quote rules even though the fault is the company’s. Well, now we have consumer forums, and even though it may take time, the consumer forums do deliver satisfaction, and allow the consumers to get benefit. Consider this case (link to article):

CHANDIGARH: Finding Reliance Communication deficient in services, UT consumer forum directed it to pay Rs 10,000 as compensation for harassment along with Rs 2,500 as litigation costs to Tejbir Kaur of Sector 46. The forum also added that Reliance was duty bound to adjust Rs 9,345 and Rs 330 received by it.
According to the complaint, Kaur had purchased internet connection for a year from Reliance for Rs 9,375, but after two months she allegedly found out that hers was an old connection because of which it terminated. She was then reportedly given a new number with the assurance that the amount already paid by her would be transferred into the new account. She, however, alleged that it was not done, rather she received legal notices for non-payment of bills.

Typically, at such times, the company officials should respond in such a way that benefits the customer, but it did not seem to happen. This case is another example of how it is to the benefit of consumers of being more aware of their rights, and how when companies are not ready to improve their services, consumers can go to consumer forums for getting justice.

The deceit of discount offers outside stores

ashish — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 12:49:12 +0000

I wonder how many times people would have noticed things like this. It was just yesterday that I went to 2 different stores - one of them had advertised for a Flat 50% discount (this was a store called Fab Creations in the Cross River Mall in East Delhi), and the other store was the Reebok store in the same mall. The Reebok store had a similar offer, with the different being that the offer was described as ‘Upto 50% off’.
First, we went to the clothes stores, there was no problem whatsoever, the clothes were indeed available at 50% off as a flat rate of discount, and the store was full of people willing to buy (and the people purchasing were not cribbing about the rate having been inflated earlier, a tactic that stores such as Cantabil, Priknit, and Kouton seem to have adopted (I wrote about this earlier - Priknit had jackets at 80% off, but the jacket that would normally have cost Rs. 1500 was priced at Rs. 5000 plus and I walked out in disgust at the horrible anti-consumer attitude of the store owners)). People were satisfied at the purchases, with the price and quality seeming right.
Next to the Reebok sale, the sale being advertised at upto 50% off. Last year, I had bought at a similar sale, but was apprehensive about the ‘About’ in the sale part this year. And to my disgust, this was exactly the case. The sale was only on the T-shirts (and the sign outside did not specify this; Reebok makes shows primarily, and the sale was not on shoes). Now, as a result, I am less likely to walk into a Reebok store when I see a sign about a sale, since I am slotting it into the same category as Woodlands (Woodlands has been in my constant no-go store list, since while I find the shoes fine, their thought process seems to be to hoodwink consumers - their sales are typically on almost discarded ranges of shoes, and the attitude they show when I ask about sale shoes is positively bad).
Is this normal behavior ? Is this right for a store to increase the expectations of consumers like this, and then let down so badly. Does it not seem that consumers will be less trusting of such brands later ?

Post office executives to pay fine for non-delivery of email

ashish — Sun, 17 May 2009 19:19:29 +0000

Government Departments and utilities have always believed that they are above the law when it relates to stuff such as consumer interests, customer complaints, and consumer forum activities. However, given that these Government utilities such as telecom, electricity, water, roads, post offices, etc get money from consumers (either in the form of direct payment such as electricity, post office, telecom or indirectly through the taxes we pay), it is only fair that they be held accountable when their customer service is below the desired quality levels or when their actions cause harm to consumers. And so it has started to happen, consider this case when the postman did not deliver a mail claiming that the address could not be found, that when the complainant directly was able to locate the address (link to article):

The South Mumbai District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum has directed the chief postmaster-general of Mumbai and the postmaster in charge of Tardeo post office to pay Rs 8,000 for non-delivery of mail. The consumer court had initially sent a notice to a Mahim airconditioner dealer after Shobha Alimchandani complained of deficiency in service but the envelope came back, with “address not known returned to sender” stamped on it. Alimchandani then located the address and filed a complaint against post office officials for shoddy service.
“We direct postal officials to jointly pay the complainant Rs 5,000 as compensation for expenses and Rs 3,000 as compensation for harassment,” the forum said. Consumer activist Rajan Alimchandani said the complaint was filed on realising that the complainant was being fooled by the postman who had not delivered the mail deliberately.

In this case, the case also included the top official of the postal department for Mumbai, thus ensuring that responsibility for shoddy performance is laid at the responsible level.

Use SMS to file complaints in the Pimpri-Chinchwad area

ashish — Sat, 16 May 2009 20:31:43 +0000

Municipal authorities have always been accused of being slow to adapt to modern technology, but now it seems that they are catching up to modern technology and adoption of the same so that their consumers find it easier to file complaints and interact with the municipal authorities. Consider this case of the municipal corporation of Pimpri-Chinchwad that has launched a SMS complaint service on a trial basis and started receiving complaints on this service (link to article):

Residents of Pimpri-Chinchwad can now register a complaint against civic problems by simply sending an SMS. The Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation (PCMC) launched the SMS complaint service on a trial basis on March 20. Since then, around 70 grievenaces have been received, of which only seven are pending.
The civic authorities will classify the compliants as either simple or complex. “Simple complaints would be those which can be solved in a few days, like potholes, choked drainages, and so on. The complex ones are those that require a longer time for redressal,” Sharma stated. The SMSes can be sent to the mobile phone number 9922501450. Citizens should include their name and address in their text message. Grievances can also be e-mailed to complaints@pcmcindia.gov.in.

It is good to see that the municipal authorities are taking action that is helpful to citizens, and one hopes that other municipal corporations also adopt such practices, and that the Pimpri-Chinchwad continues down this path.

Apollo fined Rs. 5 lakh over a man’s death

ashish — Sat, 16 May 2009 20:20:42 +0000

Apollo Hospitals is one of the providers of premium medical care, charging top rates for their services and in turn providing excellent medical services. This is an expectation that people have when they are admitted to the hospital, so when the hospital screws up somewhere in this care and does harm to the patient, there is a lot of shock. And with an increasing tendency for people to file consumer forum issues when they believe that they have not been treated well, it is becoming more common for even the better hospitals to be pulled up when their services are found wanting (link to article):

The state consumer commission has directed Apollo Hospital to pay Rs 5 lakh compensation to the kin of a patient, who died in the hospital moments after he was brought in. In this case, 31-year-old Pradeep Kumar Saini, a father of two minor kids, was admitted in Apollo Hospital on June 16, 2003 in a drowsy state. After examination, it was found that he had no medical history and his condition was stable. In fact, the family was told that he was to be discharged shortly. At no stage was it indicated that the condition of the patient was deteriorating.
Presiding over the commission, Justice JD Kapoor said that Apollo Hospital was guilty of negligence and deficiency in service for keeping the patient unattended for few hours and not making doctors available for immediate treatment.

This is not a state run hospital where patients sometimes have to wait for doctors to attend to them because of a lot of rush; premium hospitals are supposed to provide the required medical attention as and when required, and their reputations are based on these.