Duggal VS Maya Inns: Lawyer wins Rs 15,000 Compensation Over a Restaurant Complaint in Jalandhar

By Gopal Ram Tripathi

IT WAS A NOVEMBER EVENING in 2023 when advocate Sanjeev Duggal sat down with his family for a buffet dinner at Maya Inns in Jalandhar. When the bill arrived, two unfamiliar charges caught his eye — ₹128.13 and ₹23.40, each described as a service charge, amounting to ₹151.53 at 3 per cent of the total. Nobody had told him the charge existed. Nobody had asked if he agreed to it. 

When Maya Inns faced a consumer complaint over a ₹151.53 charge on a buffet bill, it offered a simple defence: the amount was not a service charge but a "staff contribution," a voluntary levy listed in the menu that any diner could have declined. The District Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission in Jalandhar examined the actual bills submitted in evidence and found that argument difficult to sustain.

The bills produced by complainant advocate Sanjeev Duggal described the amount explicitly as "service charges." Not staff contribution. Not a tip. Service charges. The restaurant had, the commission noted, also admitted collecting the amount and expressed willingness to refund it, an admission that did little to strengthen its position that no wrongdoing had occurred.

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The commission, led by President Harveen Bhardwaj and members Jyotsna and Jaswant Singh Dhillon, was not persuaded by the restaurant's rebranding of the charge. In its order dated June 4, it found that Duggal had never been clearly and unconditionally informed about the compulsory nature of the imposition, and that the restaurant's own documents confirmed this. The charge, whatever it was called, had been collected without consent. That, the forum held, added up to an unfair trade practice.

Duggal had also raised several other grievances, staff misbehaviour when he challenged the bill, food served at the buffet that he alleged was substandard, and a claim that his minor child had been billed as a fourth adult. On these points, the commission drew a line. It observed that Duggal, himself a practising advocate, would have been well aware of the steps needed to build a case, yet he produced no independent witnesses, photographs, medical records, or any complaint raised at the restaurant at the time. Allegations alone, the forum said, do not forge up a proof. Those parts of his complaint were dismissed.

How the commission ruled on each allegation

• Mandatory service charge imposed without consent — upheld. Bills confirmed the label "service charges"; no prior disclosure or consent was obtained.

• Staff misbehaviour and threats — dismissed. No supporting evidence produced; commission noted the complainant's legal background made this cut harder to explain.

• Substandard food quality — dismissed. Bare allegations without witnesses, photographs, or often occurring complaints were insufficient.

• Minor child billed as adult — dismissed. Not established on record.

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On the service charge issue alone, the commission directed Maya Inns to refund the ₹151.53 collected, with interest from the date of filing of the complaint, and to pay ₹15,000 in compensation, covering mental tension, harassment, and litigation expenses, within 45 days. Duggal had originally sought ₹5 lakh in damages; the forum confined the award to what was proved.

The ruling lands as part of a wider legal conversation about restaurant billing. The Central Consumer Protection Authority banned automatic service charges in 2022, and the Delhi High Court upheld those guidelines in March last year. An appeal remains pending. For now, the Jalandhar commission's message is plain: call it what you like on the menu — but collect it without consent, and the label on the bill will be what counts in court.

[VP]

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