MUMBAI: A private bus operator has been directed to pay Rs 15,000 compensation to a Malabar Hill family after providing poor service on a Surat-Mumbai sleeper bus in 2011. The complainant alleged that his wife was even forced to urinate in a plastic bag on the bus, after repeated requests for a halt fell on deaf ears.

On January 23, 2011, Pradeep Shah, his wife and two children were travelling from Surat to Mumbai on a sleeper bus of Surat-based Five Star King Travels; the four tickets cost a total Rs 1,600. It was an overnight journey and the family was to reach Mumbai Central at 6am. The Shahs alleged that the bus was dirty, the lights on their berths were not functioning properly and the switch, too, was broken. The family said that the window was broken and glass pieces were strewn on their berths.

In the complaint filed before the Mumbai Suburban District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum on January 11, 2013, the Shahs said that the journey commenced late and halted at various stops every 15-20 minutes. They said that several passengers got in at these stops and the bus soon got overcrowded. Though the journey was to start at 11.30pm, it actually began only at 1.20am.

On noticing holes in the window, Pradeep said he made his way through a bevy of excess passengers sleeping in the aisle and complained to the driver and the attendant.

"You find out a temporary solution to the holes. Why do you need light in the night when you are going to sleep anyway? You have got your own berths so it is none of your business to interfere with other passengers sleeping anywhere else," they allegedly told him.

Pradeep returned to his berth and stuffed the holes with paper. But when he requested the duo to stop the bus as his wife wanted to use the washroom, they told him that they would only halt at a hotel, which was fixed on their route. She was forced to urinate in a plastic bag; he described the experience his wife underwent as humiliating. Pradeep said that even his three-year-old child wet himself.

Unable to bear the harrowing experience, Pradeep sent a notice to the company, but when he got no response, he filed a complaint in the district forum. The company did not respond to the notice sent by the forum and hence, an ex parte order was passed on Wednesday. The forum said that in the absence of the company's version, Shahs' version stood unchallenged. It observed that after tendering the ticket amount, the Shahs were entitled to get all facilities as promised. The forum found the company guilty of deficiency in service and directed it to pay compensation.

