MADURAI: The District Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission in Madurai recently directed the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) to pay compensation of Rs 25,000 for collecting FASTag fee in cash from a user when the system failed to detect his tag.
The commission, chaired by its president M Piravi Perumal and member P Shanmugapriya, also directed NHAI to pay an additional Rs 10,000 to the complainant.
The petitioner Martin David, vice-principal of American College was travelling to Sivakasi on official duty and passed through the Kappalur tollgate in September 2020 where the system failed to detect his FASTag. Even though his FASTag account had sufficient funds, the toll plaza employees forced him to pay cash, ill-treated him and made him wait, David’s petitioner Dinesh Kumar said.
While returning to Madurai from Sivakasi through the same tollgate, the petitioner was subject to the same ordeal again, despite alerting the FASTag issuer bank SBI’s helpline about the issue.
NHAI submitted that the tollgate was maintained by a private entity to collect toll, and faulted SBI for deficiency in service. It also refused the claim that the toll plaza employees quarrelled with the petitioner. SBI submitted that the fault was due to NHAI’s scanner issues and not their issue.
After considering the contentions of the parties, the commission’s president M Piravi Perumal stated that the petitioner had a valid and efficient FASTag with sufficient balance. It highlighted the road transport and highways ministry’s notification that if a car’s FASTag is valid and functional, but is not detected by the scanners at a toll plaza, then the vehicle owner need not pay any fee. In such cases, the vehicle owner is exempted from paying the toll and the vehicles can exit the plaza free of cost.
“In this case, the petitioner should have been allowed to leave without paying, but NHAI employees violated the notification and collected the charge, and also ill-treated the petitioner for raising a grievance. The employees caused mental distress and indignation to the complainant. Moreover, NHAI is liable as the employees and/or the contractor was appointed by them,” the commission stated.
The commission dismissed the negligence of other respondents, including SBI, and directed NHAI to pay compensation of `25,000 for the mental agony and pain suffered by the petitioner.