Matrimonial firm found wanting, again; penalised

Ishrat S Banwait

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Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, October 5

After having been penalised for failure to provide a suitable match for a girl, Wedding Wish Private Ltd has now been fined for failing to provide a match for a boy. The complaint was filed by an Ambala resident, who was looking for a match for her brother-in-law. The firm was fined Rs 12,000, besides being told to refund Rs 45,000.

Neha Aggarwal had approached the consumer forum alleging that she had availed of the services of the firm for searching a matrimonial alliance for her brother-in-law (devar) by making a payment of Rs 50,000 for 12 months. The firm was to upload 21 profiles in her account and arrange meetings/conferences in order to find a suitable match for her brother-in-law.

However, the firm did nothing and there was no progress for providing a matching partner. The complainant even approached the police authorities with regard to deficiency in service as agreed upon between her and the company.

The complainant also made repeated requests and personal entreaties to the firm from August to October 2016 to expedite the work, but it dilly-dallied in the matter on one pretext or the other and, eventually, this led to the expiry of the service agreement.

The complainant approached the firm to renew the service agreement or refund the amount paid, along with interest, which the firm flatly refused.

Wedding Wish, in its reply, stated that the membership fee was non-refundable and non-transferable. According to the service agreement, they were bound to provide 21 profiles to the complainant, but it had provided 31 profiles till date. Of these, the brother-in-law of the complainant had rejected four profiles on the basis of the appearance of the other party. Other than that, 12 conferences were organised by them as per the preference of brother-in-law of the complainant. The remaining profiles were rejected by the complainant, it added.

The forum, in its order, observed that just within a few months of getting into contract with the opposite party, the complainant felt so harassed that he moved the police authorities complaining about the negligent and defective services provided by the opposite party. The forum thus asked Wedding Wish to refund Rs 45,000 to the complainant and pay Rs 7,000 as compensation on account of deficiency in service and causing mental and physical harassment. It was also asked to pay Rs 5,000 as the cost of litigation.