Consumer Dispute Redressal Ecosystem in Northeast

The number of consumer complaints rising in India is a positive sign of growing awareness among consumers about their rights. Speedy redressal of consumer disputes is crucial for strengthening their confidence in the legal ecosystem available for their protection. Sadly, poor implementation of the Consumer Protection Act, 2019 in the Northeastern states has left the consumers in the region vulnerable to misleading or surrogate advertisement and unfair trade practices. The Act provides for a three-tier quasi-judicial machinery at the district, state, and central levels, commonly known as “Consumer Commissions,” for the protection of the rights of consumers and to provide simple and speedy redressal of consumer disputes. The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Consumer Affairs, Food, and Public Distribution, in its latest report, sounded the alarm bell that several states in the region were not complying with the provisions of the Act, particularly the establishment of District Consumer Protection Councils (DCPCs) in every district and regular meetings of State Consumer Protection Councils (SCPCs) at least twice a year. In its report titled ‘Initiatives in the North East in the Field of Consumer Rights Protection,’ the parliamentary panel has urged the Central Government to ensure the full implementation of the Act to “safeguard the consumer rights of the region.” The gap is reflective of the failure on the part of these states to prioritise consumer rights protection despite receiving the financial support from the central government for creating the required infrastructure for consumer dispute redressal. The Northeast region accounted for 38% of total funds released by the Central Government over the past three years for the scheme of strengthening of consumer commissions, which, the government claims, speaks volumes about the special attention being paid to the region to ensure that the infrastructure is robust and is capable of delivering speedy, simple, and inexpensive resolution of consumer disputes. The committee found in December last year that even though the Act stipulates that SCPCs shall meet as and when necessary but not less than two meetings each year, the Assam SCPC had not held any meeting after its constitution. The Act provides that every consumer complaint shall be disposed of as expeditiously as possible, and an endeavour shall be made to decide the complaint within a period of three months from the date of receipt of notice by the opposite party where the complaint does not require analysis or testing of commodities and within five months if it requires analysis or testing of commodities. Online marketing gaining popularity among consumers having access to the internet is explained by the ease of selecting goods from virtual showrooms, putting them on the digital carts, and paying the sellers just by pressing the buy buttons and completing the payment process in just a couple of minutes. The limitation of the online purchase is that consumers can ascertain the quality only after receiving the delivery at their doorsteps and raise a complaint if any dispute over the quality of the goods purchased arises or any discrepancy over the claims made by the sellers on e-commerce platforms. The Act expanded the definition of consumer to include persons who buy or avail themselves of goods or services online or through electronic means, and this also led to the institutionalisation of the mechanism of filing of online consumer complaints. The Consumer Commission online application portal e-Daakhil facilitates the consumers/advocates to file the consumer complaint online, and all districts of the region being fully equipped with computer hardware, the DCPCs can access these online complaints for redressal. However, if the DCPCs and SCPCs do not hold their meetings, the complaints will only pile up even after awareness among consumers increases. The theme of this year’s National Consumer Day, observed on Tuesday, “Virtual Hearings & Digital Access to Consumer Justice,” is a reminder for the Northeastern states to ensure that all SCPCs and DCPCs become fully functional to keep pace with the spread of ecommerce activities in the region so that rights of online consumers from the region are well protected. The commissioning of an organic food testing laboratory at the National Test House Guwahati is good news for consumers in the region, as it will support testing of food items to ascertain if these conform to Bureau of Indian Standards and are safe for consumption. Consumers can play a crucial role as the eyes of the government departments tasked with ensuring the quality of goods and services available both offline and online by raising a dispute with the consumer commissions. The awareness drive on consumer rights needs to be a sustained initiative in the region, especially when a large section of consumers in many areas of the region has found e-commerce platforms more attractive as they offer wider choices and have limited products. Making the consumer rights protection ecosystem robust and functional in every district of the region is the need of the hour.