'No claim if vehicle gets stolen due to owner's negligence' in Vadodara

VADODARA: If you forgot to lock your vehicle, then you may as well forget to claim insurance too. For, this will not be labelled as 'theft' per se. A consumer forum in Vadodara dismissed a complaint filed by an owner of a vehicle whose insurance claim was rejected by the insurance firm on similar grounds.

Arpita Parmar had filed a complaint in the Vadodara district consumer disputes redressal commission (main) along with Lok Jagrut Grahak Seva Mandal against Bajaj Allianz General Insurance Company Ltd in 2019. In her complaint, Parmar said that she had bought a two-wheeler in March 2018 and got it insured from Bajaj Allianz.

In September 2018, she parked her vehicle near her office in the city but forgot its key in the vehicle's boot space. When she returned in the evening her two-wheeler was not to be found. CCTV footage showed that some unidentified person stole her vehicle, following which filed an FIR at Gotri police station and also informed the insurance firm about the theft.

Parmar told the forum that the insurance firm rejected her claim on the arguement that the complainant had mentioned in the FIR that she forgot to remove the key from the vehicle's boot space lock. The firm further said that it was the negligence on the complainant's part and hence as per the policy's terms and conditions, the insurance claim was rejected.

The forum agreed to the firm's observation that the complainant had parked the vehicle near her office on the roadside and forgot to collect the two-wheeler's keys and that it was negligence on her part. It too rejected her complaint.