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Udaipur DCDRF finds McVitie's India guilty in ’15 worms in biscuits case
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Wednesday, 23 August, 2017, 08 : 00 AM [IST]
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Prashant Nikale, Mumbai
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The District Consumer Dispute Redressal Forum (DCDRF), Udaipur, found McVitie's India guilty in the worms in biscuits case, which was filed by Deepak Harkawat, a resident of the city, in December 2015.
Recently, the biscuit maker was ordered by Randhir Singh Naruka and Anubha Sharma, respectively president and member, DCDRF, to pay Rs 9,000 (of which the damages are worth Rs 6,000 and the legal proceeding charges amount to Rs 3,000), besides refunding Rs 38 (the cost of the product).
The incident took place on September 13, 2015, when Harkawat’s wife purchased a packet of biscuits from a Big Bazaar outlet in Udaipur.
On opening it, they found worms in it, so he went to the store to claim a refund. The store refused to refund him, as the packet had been opened. So, subsequently, he contacted advocate Dileep Nagda to seek his help.
The advocate filed a complaint against McVitie's and Big Bazaar in the DCDRF on December 10, 2015.
“Both the parties refused to take any responsibility for the incident, so we decided to logged a complaint against them. Both the parties said that the packet was opened by the consumer, so they were not liable to refund him,” he added.
It is pertinent to note that the biscuit maker, in a statement, also added that the packet was within the expiry date, which was nine months from the date of packaging (June 29, 2015).
Harkawat took photographs, and presented those, along with the packet of biscuits, as evidence to the court.
Not only did the photographs show the packet contained worms, but they were present in the packet as well. That indicated that its contents were not suitable for human consumption.
Nagda stated that the product was also tested in Udaipur’s district food laboratory and declared unhealthy by food analyst Pankaj Kumar, who confirmed the same in his statement to the court, adding that the worms were present in the tested samples.
In the backdrop of the investigation and evidence, the court’s judgment read that McVitie's India was guilty, as it was the company’s product, and stated that the retailer could not be prosecuted as it was involved only in the process of selling the said product.
“We strongly backed our case, and finally, we have won it. It is a big win for us over such giants. For the last two years, we had been holding our ground, and now, it is a relief,” Nagda added.
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