Kaski District Court denies sewing machine return claim over ambiguous message

Kaski District Court denied Sarita Adhikari’s request for the return of a sewing machine or payment of its stated NPR 18,500 value, finding that she had not established the better right to possess it after an ambiguous message to Nirmal Gurung. Neither party was ordered to pay the other.

The dispute turned on whether permission to keep using a borrowed machine had become permission to keep it permanently. Although the court rejected Sarita’s claim, it expressly declined to find that Nirmal had proved the machine was a gift.

The parties agreed that Sarita bought the machine. That supported her original ownership and account of a loan, but the court said it did not settle whether their later arrangement had changed.

The central evidence was a cropped screenshot showing Sarita’s reply permitting Nirmal to keep the machine without hurry. It omitted the preceding message, which Sarita said was his offer to return it on Sunday. The screenshot established her exact words, the court reasoned, but not their disputed meaning or full context.

Both interpretations were plausible on the available record. Sarita’s account of the missing message was not a substitute for producing it, while Nirmal’s admission that he lacked further proof of a gift did not independently establish her account.

The decisive point was who had to prove the claim. Sarita bore the burden of showing that she retained the stronger right to possess or control the machine. With the meaning of her reply unresolved, the court found that she had not met that burden.

The monetary request also failed. Besides the unresolved underlying right, the judgment recorded no evidence of the machine’s present condition or a separate loss or value calculation. It also said no purchase receipt had been produced.

Sarita argued that she had lent the machine while Nirmal’s own machine was being repaired. Her response to his proposed Sunday return merely extended the borrowing period, she said: it did not authorise him to keep the machine forever. She also argued that he could have sought clarification.

Nirmal accepted that Sarita had bought the machine but maintained that her later reply gave him permanent permission to keep it. He acknowledged that the screenshot was cropped, could be read either way and did not clearly prove a gift. He asked the court to deny the claim or withhold the full monetary amount because of that uncertainty.

The dispute arose from a sewing machine supplied to Nirmal in Pokhara during repairs to his own machine. Sarita later sought its return; Nirmal relied on her intervening message as the basis for keeping it.

The judgment resolves only the claim and evidence presented in this hearing. Its distinction is narrow but important: denying Sarita relief for insufficient proof did not establish that she had transferred ownership to Nirmal.