BENGALURU: A housing finance company that failed to return the title deed and other documents pertaining to a site to a Bengalurean, though he had repaid the loan, was recently ordered by a consumer court to give him back all the papers and also pay him over Rs 1.3 lakh as compensation.
C Sathyanathan, 58, a resident of MSR Nagar in Bengaluru, raised a loan of Rs 60 lakh from CanFin Homes Ltd, in Sept 2014 with an interest of 11.20% per annum to buy a site to build a house. The loan was for a tenure of 15 years and he had to pay an EMI of Rs 68,965.
He quit his job and using all the money he got from the pension and savings, he cleared the loan in 2018, as he wanted to attend to other family commitments. He wrote to the company in Sept 2018, requesting that his property documents be returned to him but the company didn’t respond.
After waiting for a year in vain, Sathyanathan approached the IV Additional District Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission, Bengaluru with a complaint against CanFin Homes, seeking relief. He said that though he had cleared the loan, the company had not returned him the original documents of his property.
The company alleged that the elderly man still had a balance amount of Rs 1.20 lakh as a penalty that needed to be paid. They further said that the borrower had violated the loan terms that required him to buy a site and construct a house on it, but he had only purchased the site.
After examining all the documents provided by both sides, the commission recently declared that CanFin Homes was guilty of deficiency in the service provided and, had also failed to produce cogent documentary evidence to prove that the complainant still owed it money.
The commission ordered the company to return the original title deed and other documents of the property, which he had deposited with it, while availing loan. It also said the company has to pay Sathyanathan Rs 100 per day from the day of the order till it returns all the documents.
The court further directed the company to pay him a compensation of Rs 1 lakh for deficiency in service, Rs 20,000 for causing him mental agony, and Rs 10,000 as litigation costs. The company has been given 45 days to comply with the order.
Source Homevior.in
