The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : Helping the consumer remain the king

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Jun 20, 2007
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Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

Helping the consumer remain the king

Raghava M.

People have the law on their side to take action against dubious firms that cheat them

The rate of disposal of cases in State is 98 per cent
Consumer courts do not have powers civil courts enjoy

Knowing one’s rights: Despite several awareness campaigns, a section of society continues to be ignorant of the provisions of the Consumer Protection Act.

Bangalore: A child who underwent a surgical procedure at a private nursing home developed complications, leading to paralysis of its lower part of the body. The case came up before the State Consumer Commission. The owner of the nursing home, who was running the show, said he could not be held responsible for what had happened as he had leased out his nursing home. The commission was not impressed. It imposed a heavy penalty and awarded compensation to the family of the victim. This was narrated by senior advocate B.K. Nagaraja who has been regularly taking up consumer cases.

Prama R. Shetty, who invested with Channapatna MLA and Managing Director of Megacity Developers and Builders C.P. Yogeshwar was awarded a compensation of Rs. 1.03 lakh. This was because the MLA’s firm did not allot sites in the Mega City project as promised. What came to her rescue was the Section 27 of Consumer Protection Act under which the Consumer Court threatened the arrest of the MLA. This provision has since been stayed by the High Court.

In several cases the State commission has intervened and established deficiency of service. The commission has come down hard on fly-by-night operators who promise a lot but fail to deliver — be it investment firms or clinics claiming to reduce your weight.

Karnataka tops

Chandrashekaraiah, president of State Commission and a former High Court Judge, says that the perceived threat of the consumer courts acting against them has made service providers run for cover. Karnataka tops the list with the rate of disposal of consumer cases as high as 98 per cent. The Act sets a deadline of three months for cases not requiring analysis or testing and five months for those requiring analysis or testing. In most cases this has been adhered to.

Pending cases

The number of cases pending before the Commission has come down from more than 22,000 in 1989 to under 1,000 by last month. Similarly, cases pending in the District Forums have come down from 1 lakh to a mere 3,000 in this period.

What has contributed to this probably is the fact that the State commission undertakes a periodical review of the working of the district forum every two months. The practice of advocates representing the accused persons or companies is discouraged by imposing fines on them.

More can be done though. Mr. Chandrashekariah says the Government should co-operate more. For example, he says, it had not acted on the commission’s recommendation to remove the president of Haveri District Forum who is facing charges of misappropriation, choosing instead to post him to Davangere.

Not enough powers

On the other hand, consumer courts do not have the powers civil courts enjoy and cannot always ensure the implementation of their orders. It is because of this that some 400 people who invested their hard-earned money with a fly-by-night operator are awaiting justice though they were awarded compensation some six months ago. As is the case with those who held deposits with the Viniv Inc whose promoter Sreenivasa Shastry is behind the bars though he now says he intends to pay back the depositors. In either case, the Deputy Commissioner concerned, who is empowered to execute the commission’s orders, is awaiting the Government’s permission to auction the properties of the accused to generate revenue to pay the compensation. Meanwhile, the victims are left in the lurch. This situation would not have arisen if the consumer courts had powers enjoyed by civil courts, Mr. Nagaraj says.

“You cannot expect the Deputy Commissioner, who is burdened with other tasks to give priority to the orders of the consumer courts,” Y.G. Muralidharan, Director of Consumer Rights Education Awareness Trust (CREAT), says.

However, a section of society continues to be ignorant of the provisions and hardly make use of the Consumer Protection Act. Which is a pity as the State and the District Consumer Protection Councils have been constituted under the Act with the sole objective of creating awareness among people about their rights.

They are not functioning effectively as they do not have enough people committed to the cause. Mr. Muralidharan suggests that the councils need to be strengthened by involving more consumer activists.

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