Lucknow Court Orders Regsitration Of FIR Against Flipkart Officials For Allegedly Selling Fake Apple AirPods To A Lawyer

The Lucknow Court on Monday ordered the registration of a First Information Report (FIR) against Flipkart Officials after admitting a complaint filed before it by a city-based advocate alleging that he was sold fake/counterfeit Apple Airpods by the E-Commerce giant.

The Chief Judicial Magistrate Ravi Kumar Gupta passed this order on a complaint moved before him by the Lawyer Abhimanyu Singh alleging that online shopping site Flipkart sold him fake/counterfeit Apple AirPods Pro (Bluetooth Headset) for an amount of ₹17,489 in the month of August.

It is the case of Singh that on August 10, 2022, he ordered an Apple Bluetooth headset after seeing an attractive advertisement on the website of Flipkart. In lieu of this, he made an online payment of ₹17,489. Thereafter, the product was delivered to him by a Flipkart delivery partner on 12th August.

However, since he got suspicious due to the packaging of the product and the description written therein, he visited Apple's authorized service center, wherein it was told that the product received by him is fake as the same was not manufactured by the company Apple.

On this account, the Complainant called the customer executive of Flipkart that the fake product was received by him and also requested for a refund. However, on August 21, his return request was rejected by the company. Thereafter, he tried to register an FIR with the Lucknow Police, however, when all his efforts failed, he moved the instant application under Section 156(3) of the Code of Criminal Procedure before the Court of CJM, Lucknow.

In his application, he sought registration of an FIR for the offence of cheating against Flipkart and its managing directors, Kalyan Krishnamurthy as well as its sellers, Hydtel Retail Sales and Luminary Lifestyle Private Limited. Taking note of his application, the Court, on October 10, directed the Station House Officer (SHO), of Gomti Nagar Extension Police Station, Lucknow to lodge an FIR against the accused for cheating and deceiving the complainant.

Advocate Divya Singh appeared for the complainant.