RESOLUTIONS
ADOPTED AT THE CONFERENCE OF PRESIDENTS OF STATE COMMISSIONS AND SECRETARIES TO
STATE/UNION TERRITORY GOVERNMENTS IN CHARGE OF CONSUMER AFFAIRS HELD ON 15TH
MARCH 2010 IN SCOPE COMPLEX, NEW DELHI
*******************
After deliberations, the following Resolutions were adopted:
I.
GUIDELINES
ON BENCHMARK PAY, ALLOWANCES AND PERQUISITES OF PRESIDENTS AND MEMBERS OF STATE
COMMISSIONS AND DISTRICT FORUMS
1.
The recommendations of the Committee headed
by Dr. P. D. Shenoy, Former Member, National Consumer Disputes Redressal
Commission (National Commission) on pay scales (or honorarium), etc., of
Presidents and Members of State Commissions and District Forums were made prior
to the acceptance of the recommendations of the VI Central Pay Commission (CPC)
by the Union Government. That Committee itself recommended appropriate review
of the amounts suggested after the acceptance of the VI CPC recommendations.
2.
In view of the foregoing, RESOLVED that with effect from 1st
January 2010, the benchmark pay scales or honoraria shall be as under:
(i)
The service conditions, including salary,
allowances and perquisites of the President of State Commissions shall be the
same as those of a sitting Judge of the High Court.
(ii)
Full-time Members of State Commissions
shall be entitled to the pay band of a District Judge (reduced by pension if a
retired officer is employed). Dearness and all other allowance shall be payable
accordingly.
(iii)
Part-time Members of State Commissions
shall be entitled to honorarium of Rs. 25,000/- per month, which should be
enhanced on the first January each year by the same percentage as that of
dearness allowance admissible to State Government employees in similar pay
band. In addition, a conveyance allowance of Rs. 500/- per day of sitting
should be paid.
(iv)
The service conditions, including salary,
allowances and perquisites of the President of District Forums shall be the
same as those of a sitting District Judge.
(v)
Full-time Members of District Forums shall
be entitled to the pay band of a Senior Division Civil Judge (reduced by
pension if a retired officer is employed). Dearness and all other allowance
should be payable accordingly.
(vi)
Part-time Members of District Forums shall
be entitled to honorarium of Rs. 20,000/- per month, which should be enhanced
on the first January each year by the same percentage as that of dearness
allowance admissible to State Government employees in similar pay band. In
addition, a conveyance allowance of Rs. 300/- per day of sitting should be
paid.
3.
ALSO
RESOLVED that while full-time Members of the State Commissions
and District Forums shall be paid salary/pay and all other admissible
allowances according to the pay scales/bands recommended above, honoraria and
conveyance allowance shall be payable only when part-time Members are appointed
after due consideration of the volume of work of a Bench of a State Commission
or of a District Forum.
4.
FURTHER
RESOLVED that (a) the State Governments should make all possible
efforts to implement these benchmarks at the earliest so that quality manpower
is attracted to and employed in the Consumer Fora, keeping in view the fact
that these Fora dispense justice at lower costs and more expeditiously, help
reduce the workload of the Civil Courts substantially and thus enhance the
quality of governance and reduce the “credibility deficit” that the Governments
may otherwise encounter and (b) the Central Government in the Department of
Consumer Affairs shall facilitate and expedite the process of implementation of
these Resolutions by circulating the Resolutions to the State Governments along
with the recommendations of the Standing Parliamentary Committee in this behalf
and following up the implementation expeditiously.
II.
EXPEDITIOUS
DISPOSAL OF COMPLAINTS, APPEALS, ETC., MONITORING OF PERFORMANCE AND REGULAR
REPORTING
1.
RESOLVED
that
to liquidate the arrears of consumer cases and ensure disposal of fresh cases
according to the time schedule specified in the Consumer Protection Act (CPA),
1986:
(i)
wherever necessary, the State Commissions
shall propose creation of additional permanent Benches of the State Commission
as well as creation of new District Forums (with copy of the proposal being
sent to the National Commission) and the State/UT Governments concerned shall
consider such proposals expeditiously – by and large, attempt should be made to
create an additional Bench of the State Commission for each 500 cases (pending
as at the end of December 2010) and one additional District Forum for each 250
complaints (pending as at the end of December 2010);
(ii)
wherever such proposals are not approved by
the State Governments within six months, the State Commission President shall
report the matter to the National Commission so as to enable the National
Commission to take up the matter with the State Government concerned as well as
the Secretary, Department of Consumer Affairs of the Central Government, for
follow-up;
(iii)
Presidents of State Commissions shall
regularly follow up their proposals for (a) creation of additional Benches/new
District Forums and (b) filling up of existing vacancies in the State
Commission/District Forums with the State Governments concerned for, the most
effective way to resolve such issues continues to be personal contact and
persuasion;
(iv)
as almost 80% of the total pendency of old
cases with the State Commissions is accounted for by the States of Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Haryana, Orissa,
Punjab, Gujarat and Bihar (in that order), the Presidents of these State
Commissions shall make special efforts to set up additional Benches and the
National Commission as well as the Department of Consumer Affairs of the
Central Government shall follow up this matter with the State Governments on
priority;
(v)
to enable timely filling up of vacancies,
proposals for selection must be made six months prior to the date(s) of likely vacancies
and the process of selection completed well within that period so that the
State Government concerned can be pressed for approval soon thereafter and the
vacancies filled as soon as they occur;
(vi)
pending establishment of additional
District Forums, attempts should be made by the Presidents of State Commissions
to utilise the services of Presidents and Members of the existing District
Forums, with comparatively less workload, to dispose of cases before District
Forums with heavier load, wherever such arrangement is geographically and
administratively feasible;
(vii)
as a matter of general rule, emphasis
should be on (a) adoption of summary procedure based on principles of natural
justice as mandated under section 13 of the CPA, (b) avoidance of unnecessary and
long adjournments (with imposition of costs whenever adjournments are deemed to
be on untenable grounds), (c) insistence on written arguments if parties are
represented by counsel, (d) prompt pronouncement of orders, and (e) timely
communication of orders to the parties;
(viii)
in the process of reducing the pendency,
cases should be listed in chronological order (oldest first) for hearing and
disposal, due regard being had to the priority required to be accorded to cases
involving senior citizens and women;
(ix)
disposal of cases, with priority to old
cases, should be such that the total disposal over each quarter is more than
the total institution of new cases in that quarter; and
(x)
the Consumer Fora should also try, as far
as practicable, to resolve consumer disputes through conciliation/ mediation as
a means of alternative dispute resolution on the last working day of each
month.
2.
ALSO
RESOLVED that reporting of performance in respect of institution
and disposal of cases by the State Commissions and District Fora in the formats
and at the frequencies prescribed by the National Commission being a sine qua non in terms of the provisions
of section 24B of the CPA, necessary action shall be taken before or by the due
date(s) by all concerned.
3.
FURTHER
RESOLVED that (a) Presidents of State Commissions should
regularly monitor the performance of the District Forums in their respective
States, including reduction in pendency through speedy and systematic disposal
of cases, regular reporting, punctuality in attendance as well as observance of
adequate number of hours of working and (b) each State Commission should
organise, under intimation to the National Commission and the State Government,
an annual meeting of the Presidents and Members of all District Forums to
discuss various important issues, so that at least one of the Members of the
National Commission (nominated by the President) and the Secretary to the State
Government in charge of Consumer Affairs could also join such meetings.
III.
DELEGATION OF FINANCIAL POWERS AND TIMELY
RELEASE OF ADEQUATE FUNDS
RESOLVED that
each State/UT Government shall (a) take expeditious action to declare the
President of the State Commission as “Head of Department” and the Presidents of
the District Forums as “Head of Office” under their respective Delegation of
Financial Powers Rules, wherever this has not been done so far, (b) make
adequate budget provision to enable these Fora to meet their non-Plan
expenditure and (c) release the Plan grants received from the Central
Government and the Plan as well non-Plan grants provided for in the State
Budget in time.
IV.
TRAINING
RESOLVED that
while the existing programme of training the new Presidents and Members of
State Commissions and District Forums with the assistance of the Indian
Institute of Public Administration (IIPA) would continue, the National
Commission would explore with the Department of Consumer Affairs of the Central
Government and the IIPA the possibility of conducting (a) decentralised
training programmes at some select locations for each State or a group of
States and (b) training programmes for new Members of the National Commission.
V.
USE
OF INFORMATION TECHNOLGY
In
view of the fact that the use of information technology, by way of optimal
implementation of the on-going CONFONET Project, can substantially assist, on
the one hand, in speedy disposal of cases by standardising case entry details
on institution, automatic generation of notices as well as recording day-to-day
proceedings of each individual case upto and including the passing of final
orders and, on the other, in facilitating on-line access of the parties to the
progress of their cases from listing upto and including final orders, RESOLVED that (i) the State Commissions
and the District Forums should ensure that (a) their staff is adequately
trained in the use of CONFONET with the help of the Technical Service Providers
(TSPs) being arranged by the National Informatics Centre (NIC) and (b) the
data, orders, etc., are regularly uploaded and (ii) the State Governments
should ensure that adequate funds are provided to the State Commission and the
District Forums to enable them to arrange appropriate annual maintenance
contracts for the entire range of hardware, including servers, UPS’s, etc.
VI. UNIFORMITY IN PROCEDURES
With
a view to bringing about uniformity in the nomenclature of cases and the
procedure of listing to ensure priority of disposal in accordance with the
Consumer Protection Regulations, 2005, RESOLVED
that the National Commission would arrange regional meetings of the
Registrars/Secretaries of State Commissions and the Registrar of the National
Commission.
VII. CONSUMER ADVOCATE – THE NEWSLETTER
RESOLVED that
the State Commissions would ensure that copies of the Newsletter are sent to
the District Fora in the States, and also inform the National Commission if the
Newsletter is serving the aim with which it has been re-launched.
VIII. ACTION TAKEN REPORTS
RESOLVED that
all State Commissions should submit Action Taken Report on the Resolutions
adopted at the Conference held on 15th March 2009 within one month
(if not done already) and that on the Resolutions adopted at this Conference by
15th July 2010.
******************