Varun Mahajan, a resident of Sector 9 got himself photographed at Roshan Studios, Sector 9 and paid Rs 60 for that. Though he got the photographs, inspite of demanding the negative, it was not handed over to him. The customer filed a complaint calling this an `unfair trade practice and exploitative in nature' besides demanding Rs 10,000 towards damages and loss.

The opposite party in its reply maintained that as per the contract between the parties, only the photographs were required to be delivered and not the negative. It was contended that negative is the property of the studio as a lot of effort had gone into it and also it depicted art and skill.

The Forum comprising of its president R.P.Bajaj and members H.S.Walia and Kamlesh Gupta observed that while charging the money for delivering the photographs, the studio must have taken all factors into account. The charges would have included the cost of the film exposed, the development charges and the cost of providing prints of the photographs.

The Forum maintained that the negative is the part of that film exposed for taking the photograph. Having charged the price including the cost of the film, the studio cannot retain the ownership rights over that negative. Also the touching or retouching done on the negative is not a case of `rare' art, the Forum asserted.

The Forum also observed that the negative would lie in stock with the studio in the hope that some day the customer might come to have more copies of the photograph. This would enable the studio to charge more money from the complainant to provide extra prints, the Forum reasoned.

Also, since in the receipt issued by the studio it was not indicated that the negative would not be handed over to the customer, the Forum maintained that the refusal to hand over the negative to the customer amounts not only to deficiency in service on the part of the studio but is also unfair trade practice. The studio has been directed to hand over the negative to the complainant with costs of Rs 550.