Received show cause notice from CCPA for alleged violation of consumer rights: Ola Electric
New Delhi, Oct 8: The Central Consumer Protection Authority has issued a show cause notice to Ola Electric for alleged violation of consumer rights, misleading advertisement and unfair trade practices, according to a regulatory filing by the company.
The company received the show cause notice by email on October 7, 2024, Ola Electric said in the filing.
The show cause notice has been issued by the "Central Consumer Protection Authority (CCPA) for alleged violation of consumer rights, misleading advertisement and unfair trade practices", it added.
The authority has provided a timeline of 15 days for the company to respond to the show cause notice, the filing said.
Further, the filing said the company will respond to the authority within the given timeframe with the supporting documents.
The notice comes after a war of words broke out between Ola founder Bhavish Agarwal and stand-up comedian Kunal Kamra on Sunday on social media platform X over the after-sales and service quality of the company's electric scooters.
Kamra had taken up after-sales and service issues faced by Ola Electric customers.
It started when Kamra responded to a post by Agarwal on X where the founder had posted a photo of Ola's gigafactory with several Ola Electric scooters that seemed to be waiting for servicing.
"Do indian consumers have a voice? Do they deserve this? Two wheelers are many daily wage workers lifeline," Kamra wrote along with the photo.
He tagged Union Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari, asking "is this how Indians will get to using EV's?" The comedian also tagged the official handle of the Department of Consumer Affairs, Government of India @jagograhakjago, seeking an answer saying "any word?" Kamra further wrote, "Anyone who has an issue with OLA electric leave your story below tagging all.
To this, Agarwal responded, "Since you care so much @kunalkamra88, come and help us out! I'll even pay more than you earned for this paid tweet or from your failed comedy career. Or else sit quiet and let us focus on fixing the issues for the real customers." He further said, "We're expanding service network fast and backlogs will be cleared soon."
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'Low-quality' catheters supplied to West Bengal govt hospitals at high price, probe ordered
Kolkata (PTI): The West Bengal health department has launched a probe into the supplies of allegedly low-quality and locally made catheters at a high price to several government hospitals, posing a risk to the lives of patients undergoing treatment in these facilities, officials said.
Such central venous catheters (CVCs) were allegedly supplied to at least five medical colleges and hospitals in the state, defying allocation of international standard-compliant CVCs, they said.
The distribution company, which has been accused of supplying these catheters to government hospitals, admitted to the fault but placed the blame on its employees.
"We started checking stocks some time back and found these locally made CVCs in my hospital store. These catheters are of low quality as compared to those allocated by the state. We have informed the state health department," a senior official of the Calcutta Medical College and Hospital told PTI.
Low-quality catheters were also found in the stores of other hospitals, which indicates "possible involvement of insiders in the scam", a health department official said.
The low-quality CVCs were supplied by a distributor in the Hatibagan area in the northern part of Kolkata for the last three to four months, he said.
"Such kinds of local CVCs are priced around Rs 1,500 but the distributor took Rs 4,177 for each device," the official said.
A CVC is a thin and flexible tube that is inserted into a vein to allow for the administration of fluids, blood, and other treatment. It's also clinically called a central line catheter.
"An initial probe revealed that the distribution company Prakash Surgical had supplied the low-quality and locally manufactured catheters to several government hospitals instead of the CVCs of the government-designated international company.
"All the units will be tested and a proper investigation is on to find out who benefited from these supplies," the health department official said.
The distribution company blamed its employees for the supply of inferior quality catheters.
"I was sick for a few months. Some employees of the organisation made this mistake. We are taking back all those units that have gone to the hospitals. It's all about misunderstanding," an official of the distribution company told PTI.
According to another state health department official, a complaint was lodged with the police in this connection.
Asked about how many patients were affected by the usage of such low-quality CVCs, the official said, "The probe would also try to find that out".
According to sources in the health department, some of the staff of the hospitals' equipment receiving departments and some local officials of international organisations might be involved in the alleged irregularities.
