Awareness of Working and Non Working Women Regarding Consumer Protection Act 1986

 

Ranjana Chaudhary, Rekha Dayal, Nimisha Awasthi and Poonam Singh

 

ABSTRACT:

The objective of the Consumer Protection Act, 1986 to provide speedy, simple and inexpensive redressal of consumer disputes has, therefore, been accomplished by the established of three-tier system for the redressal of grievances under the Act. Hence, in the present study entitled “Awareness of Consumer Rights and Responsibilities among Working and Non Working Women of Kanpur Nagar” efforts were made to assess the awareness and adoption practices consumer rights and responsibilities of working and non working women. Descriptive research design was used and data was collected on 120 working and 120 non-working women from 1^st, 3rd, 4th and 5^th zone of Kanpur Nagar. Pre- structured interview schedule was administered for data collection. Data on awareness of consumer protection act 1986 was collected by using Robert B. Frary 1996 Three-point scale. Analysis of data reveals that about CPA most of the working women were aware that compensation can be claimed for the loss (rank I) and non - working women knows simple formalities to file complaint (rank I). Most of working women and non-working  women know that  this act protect against misleading advertisement (rank I) and poor after sale service (rank II) whereas they are least aware about deficiency of product and service. For redressal majority were aware about complaining to manufacturer (rank I) and ranked awareness about wool mark first.

 

KEY WORD: CPA, Redressal, Standard Marks, Grievances, Working and Non-Working Women

 

INTRODUCTION:

The CPA, 1986 has been enacted to promote and protect the rights of consumers and provide speedy and simple redressal to consumer disputes. The three-tier quasi judicial machinery is sought to be set up at the District, State and Central levels who are to observe the principles of natural justice and have been empowered to give reliefs of a specific nature and to award whatever appropriate compensation to the consumer. Regarding the implementation of the Act the redressal machinery has not been made functional in all States/Union territories. In this connection, it become necessary that other states should make sincere efforts to implement CPA by establishing district and state level redressal agencies without any further delay.

 

The reasons for the delay in disposal of cases were the reluctant behaviour of consumer court, irresponsible behaviour of lawyers and pending of large number of cases. Though the consumers can approach the forums directly for redressal of their grievances, they can file cases either through lawyers or voluntary consumer organization. The majority of the cases were filed through lawyers in both forums. The real purposes of consumer laws is not to make the task of securing compensation easier, but to increase the feeling of responsibility of the supplier and to reduce the risk of faulty goods or services that he wants. The real aim of the consumer protection is to compel the manufacturer and producer is to sell standard products, at fair prices, with full details of weight and measures, maintain purity in food stuff and drug. The public shall have to assert its right and demand that courts function properly. The consumer shall have come to their rescue because an alert consumer is an asset to nation. The success of this legislation will depend on effective implementation of its provision by the Central and State governments in letter and sprits. In addition, it will require support of strong broad-based consumer movement in the country, involvement of women and youth and cooperation trade and industry. Consumer education is one of these rights of consumer which is provided in United Nations guidelines as well as in CPA itself. The majority of the people in these areas opined that certainly the consumer education is helpful to prevent him from any kind of exploitation.

 

MATERIAL AND METHOD:

Descriptive research design was planned for the present study. Data was collected on 120 working and 120 non-working women from 1^st, 3rd, 4th and 5^th zone of Kanpur Nagar. Thirty respondents from each selected localities of different zones (Zone I –Kalyanpur, Nawabganj, Geetanagar and kakadeo, Zone III-Govind Nagar and Shastri nagar, Zone IV-Sisamau and Zone V- Generalganj) were selected for data collection. Pre- structured interview schedule was administered for data collection. Data on awareness of consumer protection act was collected by using Robert B. Frary 1996 three-point scale. Statistical analysis of data was done by applying Frequency, Percentage, mean, S.D. Score, rank, Chi square and Paired t Test.

 

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION:

Awareness about CPA

To analyze the awareness of consumer protection act 1986. It has observed on the group of 120 Working and Non-Working Women. It is found in table 1  that 36.00 per cent working women are fully aware about the process of CPA, 26.00 per cent are partially aware about it and 58.00 per cent are unaware about it.  Only 38.00 per cent know about the help of advocacy, 32.00 per cent have knowledge of it as there is a kind of law for CPA, and 50.00 per cent are unaware of it. Some of them have a good knowledge about the filing and trials of the CPA cases. And also such type of cases are not so expensive, when they know about the fact of expenses, they become surprised to know it.

 

Protection offered against CPA

Data in table 2 reveals that both working  m.s. 2.12 and non working m.s.1.98 women were aware that CPA protects against misleading advertisement at Rank I whereas awareness was at rank II for poor after sale service with m.s. 2.11 for working women and m.s.1.78 for non working women. Least awareness for protection offered against CPA was observed for deficiency in product and service m.s.1.85 among working women and for violations of any other applicable laws and regulations m.s.1.35 among non working women RankVIII. It shows that working women were more aware about protection offered against CPA.       

 

Redressal Mechanism

Analysis of data in table 3 reveals that regarding redressal mechanism consumer showed highest awareness about compliance to the seller/manufacturer (m.s. 2.37 for working women and m.s. 2.12 for non-working women) rank I. Working women ranked II to complaining to MRTP commission (m.s. 2.27) whereas nonworking women to giving complaint to redressal cell (m.s.1.60) and vice versa for rank III with m.s. 2.25 for working women and m.s. 1.50 for non-working women. Complaining to civil court was ranked V by working women (m.s.2.03) and IV by non-working women (m.s. 1.47), whereas, complaining to the officer of respective department was ranked IV by working women (m.s.2.18 ) and V by non-working women (m.s. 1.35). Both the group of respondents showed least awareness Rank VI about filling case in consumer forum m.s.1.80 working women and m.s. 1.35 non-working women. Overall mean score for awareness was observed higher among working women as compared to non- working women.

 

Standard marks:

 from the table 4 it is revealed that both working m.s.2.45 and non working m.s. 1.87 women showed highest awareness about WOOL Mark followed by ISI Mark m.s.2.27 and m.s.1.68 respectively.  Working women were also showed awareness about AGMARK at Rank II m.s. 2.27. FPO was ranked III by both working and non working women for awareness with m.s. 2.05 and m.s.1.53 respectively. It is clear that working women were more aware than non working women as for as awareness for standard marks is concerned.

 

CONCLUSION:

The study has revealed the fact that the consumers in general, lack consumer rights awareness regarding the existence of protective services provided by the government and the voluntary  consumer organization for redressal of their grievances and that is the main cause that the consumer in this area are prone to exploitation in the market today. During the course of study, it was found that consumers were not completely satisfied with the functioning of the Consumer Dispute Redressal Forum (CDRF). At the same time, they also expressed their dissatisfaction with regard to the use of day to day products and the services of various kinds including the public utility departments. The study, thus, has revealed the slacunae in the existing protective services available in India particularly in these areas, which would serve as clue to the authorities to make improvements in these measures. For the redressal of their grievances with regard to both the products and services, if they approach the   district forum, more time is required for the disposal of their complaints.

 

REFERENCES:

Frary, Robert B. (1996). Hints for designing effective questionnaires. Practical Assessment, Research and Evaluation, A peer-reviewed electronic journal. ISSN 1531-7714 5(3). Retrieved January 6, 2014 from http://PAREonline.net/getvn.asp?v=5andn=3 .

 

Received on 10.01.2014          Modified on 11.02.2014

Accepted on 20.03.2014         © A&V Publication all right reserved