Consumer courts: SC expresses displeasure on absence of reports from states

The Supreme Court on Wednesday expressed displeasure over failure of some states to provide information about the vacancy positions and infrastructure for consumer courts in their territories and warned them to impose cost of Rs one to two lakh for recovery from the officers concerned.

"We are not inclined to appreciate wastage of judicial time by parties in defaulting in such a matter. This results in a considerable time period of courts being spent. We will impose exemplary costs on defaulting states for wastage of judicial time for recovery against officers," a bench presided over by Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul said.

The court's warning came after amicus curiae senior advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan submitted a number of states, including Goa, Delhi, Rajasthan, Kerala and Punjab have not submitted information for staff. The state of Bihar has submitted a status report for infrastructure.

Examining a suo motu matter related to vacancies and infrastructure in consumer courts across the country, the bench said, "Somehow respect for time schedules is not kept and unfortunately it throws the hearing out of gear for the simple reason that we don't seem to discipline ourselves with any sense of time."

The court reminded the states that filling up vacancies and providing adequate infrastructure was effectively their work.

"So what is the judicial intervention required to ask the states to perform their obligation under the Statute. Please appreciate the scope of the Consumer Protection Act. It is to redress the small aspect of daily lives of the consumers. It makes, if I may say so, political sense to see that these posts are manned so that grievances of the people are remedied. That's all that is required," the bench added.

In the absence of a detailed report from the states, it was a little bit of stumbling in the dark, the bench pointed out.

The court put the matter for further consideration on December 1.

On August 11, the top court had pulled up the states for "defeating the laws enacted for the benefits of people," as it directed them to fill up around 800 vacancies in consumer courts across the country within eight weeks.

On October 22, it asked states to provide details of infrastructure available to consumer fora to the amicus curiae within a week, failing which concerned secretary would be personally present before it.

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