Central Govt Notifies 'Consumer Protection Rules 2021' Revising Pecuniary Jurisdiction Of District, State & National Commissions

The Central Government has notified the Consumer Protection (Jurisdiction of the District Commission, the State Commission, and the National Commission) Rules, 2021 that aims to revise the pecuniary jurisdiction of all the three commissions, i.e., District, State, and National Commissions.

Significantly, the Consumer Protection Act, 2019 promulgates a three-tier quasi-judicial mechanism for redressal of consumer disputes namely district commissions, state commissions and national commission. The Act also stipulates the pecuniary jurisdiction of each tier of consumer commission.

The revised financial ambit of the customer complaints that can be examined by the District, State, and National commissions is as follows:

• The District Commission shall have the jurisdiction to entertain complaints where the value of the goods or services paid as consideration does not exceed fifty lakh rupees (up to Rs 50 lakh; earlier limit: up to 1 crore).
  
• The State Commission shall have jurisdiction to entertain complaints where the value of the goods or services paid as consideration exceeds fifty lakh but does not exceed two crore rupees (above Rs 50 lakh up to Rs 2 crore; earlier limit: above 1 crore and up to 10 Crore).
  
• The National Commission shall have jurisdiction to entertain complaints where the value of the goods or services paid as consideration, exceeds two crore rupees (above Rs 2 crore; earlier limit: above 10 crores).
  

These rules have been notified in exercise of powers conferred by provisos to sub-section (1) of Section 34, sub-clause (i) of clause (a) of sub-section (1) of section 47 and sub-clause (i) of clause (a) of sub-section (1) of section 58 read with sub-clauses (o), (x) and (zc) of sub-section (2) of section 101 of the Consumer Protection Act, 2019.

It may be noted that as of now, the District Commissions have jurisdiction to entertain complaints where the value of the goods or services paid as consideration does not exceed one crore rupees.

The State Commissions have the jurisdiction to entertain complaints where the value of the goods or services paid as consideration, exceeds 1 crore rupees but does not exceed 10 crore rupees and National Commission has jurisdiction to entertain complaints where the value of goods or services paid as consideration exceeds 10 crore rupees.

Importantly, after the Consumer Protection Act, 2019 came into force, it was observed that the existing provisions relating to pecuniary jurisdiction of consumer commissions were leading to cases which could earlier be filed in National Commission to be filed in State Commissions and cases which could earlier be filed in State Commissions to be filed in District Commissions.

This caused a significant increase in the workload of District Commissions, leading to rising in pendency and delay in disposal of cases, defeating the very object of securing speedy redressal to consumers as envisaged under the Act, therefore the above-mentioned changes have been brought in by notifying Consumer Protection (Jurisdiction of the District Commission, the State Commission, and the National Commission) Rules, 2021.