Coming down heavily on ICICI Bank for making unsolicited calls to mobile-phone users, the Delhi High Court on Wednesday declined to stay the contempt proceedings initiated against it in the State Consumer Commission on a cell-phone user’s complaint. Citing their own experience of receiving pesky calls from the bank about personal loans and other bank schemes, a Division Bench comprising Justice Vikramjit Sen and Justice S L Bhayana strongly observed: “At all times of the day, we get calls from ICICI Bank. You think you are above the law.”
“Everyday, we get nuisance calls. What business you get out of such calls. Face the music for making nuisance calls,” Justice Sen noted and refused to grant stay on the ongoing contempt petition filed by advocate Nivedita Sharma.
The court was hearing an application filed by the bank, seeking the high court’s intervention and a stay on the contempt petition. Sharma, in a contempt petition filed before the State Commission, stated that she had been receiving calls from ICICI bank despite a direction from the commission to stop harassing consumers.
On her complaint, the commission in December 2006 imposed an exemplary cost of Rs 50 lakh on Airtel for its failure to control the pesky calls made by telemarketers and banks. The commission also imposed Rs 25-lakh penalty, to be jointly paid by ICICI Bank and American Express Bank, for making repeated calls to mobile users, she said.
She claimed that the commission had observed that in case these calls did not stop and if consumers were still subjected to such harassment, they could approach the commission against the bank and telemarketers.
