New Delhi, June 27: Between January and March 2007, Pramod Gupta says, he bought 50 packets of Surf Excel for his family of 10. All because an ad campaign had offered cash prizes to lucky buyers whose packets contained a swatch of cloth carrying a number.

Today, Gupta received a consumer court's order that asks Hindustan Unilever, the Surf Excel manufacturer, to pay the Rs 5 lakh it had denied him when he furnished what he thought was the winning swatch - plus 9 per cent annual interest.

Gupta wanted to send a message, much like Lalitaji - the uncompromising and quality-conscious campaign character who helped Surf take on Nirma in the 1980s through a blockbuster advertisement.

The Delhi State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission has ruled the company committed "fraud" by failing to reveal that the prizes hinged on the swatches carrying not just the number, as advertised, but also a unique code. It has additionally fined the company Rs 25 lakh for the "harassment, mental agony and anguish" caused to many other unidentified customers who too would have staked their claims and been refused.

Further, the commission has imposed costs of Rs 2 lakh on the company while rejecting its appeal against a 2012 verdict by the district consumer forum, which also had ruled in Gupta's favour. The court has sent a copy of the order to Hindustan Unilever too.The company has the option of challenging the verdict before the National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission.

In response to an email query from The Telegraph , a Hindustan Unilever spokesperson said: "The state commission order emanates from a consumer promotion scheme of Surf Excel run in 2006. All consumer promotions at HUL are run in accordance with law and in the interest of business and consumer alike.

"We deny that any fraud has been played on consumers. The rightful winners have been conferred with the scholarship reward as per the scheme. We are examining the order and will take suitable steps in accordance with law."

Gupta said: "I hope I get the money. My daughter Kanika was seven when I bought the detergent packets hoping to fund her dream of becoming a doctor. She's now 17."

With nine year's interest, the sum will be more than Rs 9 lakh. Gupta said he worked for a local "communication firm", earning around Rs 6 lakh a year.

Under the promotional campaign, Hindustan Unilever was to provide a swatch in every 500gm, 750gm, 1kg and 1.5kg packet of Surf Excel. Some of the swatches, after washing, were to reveal a number, which would vary from 1/10 to 10/10.

Customers whose swatches carried a score of 10/10 would receive the highest prize of Rs 5 lakh, the ad said, as did the offer document - a printed note inside the packet.

Gupta remembers buying the winning swatch around March 20, 2007, just days short of the last date for filing claims: March 31. He decided not to risk missing the deadline by sending his claim by post, so he caught a flight to Mumbai just to present his swatch at the company headquarters and flew back the same day. "I couldn't afford to miss more than a day's work," he said.

When Hindustan Unilever refused to pay up, Gupta took it to the New Delhi District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum, which asked the company in 2012 to honour its Rs 5-lakh offer.

In its appeal to the state commission, the company said that only four packets had contained swatches carrying the score of 10/10 along with the code, and Gupta's swatch lacked the code.

At the last hearing in May 2015, the consumer court had reserved its judgment, which it delivered by post to Gupta today.

The court saw nothing wrong in the company - referred to as "OP" in the judgment - tying the prize to a code as well as a number.

"But what is the point in not telling the customer that a unique code had been used in four swatches or in a few swatches?" commission member N.P. Kaushik said in his order.

"Why the OP played this trick with the customers? Obviously it was to make them purchase more and more packets to find a swatch with 10/10 score."

The order adds: "I am left with no option but to hold that the OP in the garb of becoming a philanthropist has befooled a large number of its customers in the country... played a fraud upon its customers by floating a misleading and fraudulent advertisement."

Many other consumers too would have been denied their prize on the same ground but, unlike Gupta, would not have taken the matter up with the consumer courts, the order says. Therefore, it adds, it is imposing a Rs 25-lakh fine, to be deposited within 60 days with the state consumer welfare fund, failing which interest would be charged at 12 per cent a year.

Gupta, however, hasn't stopped using Surf Excel. "I have to wash clothes, so why not Surf Excel? I just wanted to send a message to these corporate groups: do not mess with consumers like us."