lucknow soon to touch the age of 70 years ml sahu had never thought that the llb degree he had earned in 1998 before joining government service would help him win a case against a real estate giant 21 years laterthree years after he plunged into a legal battle the 69yearold retired administrative officer of kendriya vidyalaya sangathan has finally been able to recover the money he was allegedly duped into paying to the company he also received damages for mental harassmentsahu studied law at guwahati university before he became an administrative officer settled in lucknow sahu had registered a onebedroom flat in a private housing society on shaheed path in 2009 he had paid rs 13 lakh for the flat in instalments over four yearshowever after giving possession of the flat to sahu the builder asked him to pay an extra rs 37 lakh saying that the super area of the housing unit had been increased by 97 sq feeti paid the amount but asked the company to show documents regarding the increased area however the company denied following which i filed a case in the district consumer court in 2015 i first got himself registered as a lawyer at bar council of consumer court and represented my case sahu told toihe had hired a private agency to verify the claim by the company of increasing the super area the agency found no area was increased later the court also got it verified through lucknow development authority which came to a similar conclusion he saidthe company meanwhile argued that sahus petition was untenable in a consumer court because he is an investor and not a consumer it also claimed that the transaction was fairhowever the court last april directed the company to pay rs 52 lakh to sahu the amount included 9 interest and rs 20000 as compensation for harassmentthe company deposited the money in court in december 2018 it took eight more months to complete formalities the money was finally paid to me on tuesday said sahucompany officials did not respond to repeated calls and messages by toi