What is Consumer Awareness?

Consumer is the person who hires or avails of any services for a consideration which has been
paid or promised or partly paid and partly promised or under any system of deferred payment.
But Consumer exploitation is very rampant these days. Consumers get exploited in many ways
through the more dominating and knowledgeable sources. Till the 1960s, India was plagued with
cases of black marketeering, hoarding, inadequate weighing and food adulteration. These were
problems that affected the well-being of the consumer and amount to consumer exploitation.

The consumer movement began in the 1960s and gained momentum in the 1970s. Consumer
dissatisfaction started to be demonstrated through the written word and in articles and
newspapers.

Consumer awareness is a broader and wider concept. Consumer Awareness is an act of making
sure the buyer or consumer is aware of the information about products, goods, services, and
consumers rights. Consumer awareness is important so that buyer can take the right decision and
make the right choice. Consumers have the right to information, right to choose, right to safety.

Consumer awareness is important to educate consumers about their rights. It is required to

remove illiteracy and lack of education regarding the rights that enhance the status of consumers
and protect them from exploitation. It allows them to be less ignorant of their rights and seek
redressal if they are exploited by sellers, retailers or manufacturers in the market.

What are Consumer Rights?

There are six broad consumer rights defined as per the Consumer Protection Act, 1986. These
are:

Right to Safety

The Consumer Protection Act defines this right as a protection against goods and services that
are ‘hazardous to life and property’. This particularly applies to medicines, pharmaceuticals,
foodstuffs, and automobiles. The right requires all such products of critical nature to life and
property to be carefully tested and validated before being marketed to the consumer.

Right to Information
This right mentions the need for consumers to be informed about the quality and quantity of
goods being sold. They must be informed about the price of the product and have access to other
information specific to the product that they wish to consume.

Right to Choose

The consumer must have the right to choose between different products at competitive prices.
Thus, the concept of a competitive market where many sellers sell similar products must be
established to ensure that the consumer can actually choose what to consume and in what
quantity. This is to avoid monopoly in the market.

Right to Seek Redressal

When a consumer feels exploited, he/she has the right to approach a consumer courtto file a
complaint. A consumer court is a forum that hears the complaint and provides justice to the party
that has been hurt. Thus, if the consumer feels he/she has been exploited, they can approach the
court using this right.

Right to be Heard

The purpose of this right is to ensure that the consumer gets due recognition in consumer courts
or redressal forums. Basically, when a consumer feels exploited, he has the right to approach a
consumer court to voice his complaint. This right gives him/her due respect that his/her
complaint will be duly heard. The right empowers consumers to fearlessly voice their concerns
and seek justice in case they are exploited.

Right to Consumer Education

Consumers must be aware of their rights and must have access to enough information while
making consumption decisions. Such information can help them to choose what to purchase,
how much to purchase and at what price. Many consumers in India are not even aware that they
are protected by the Act. Unless they know, they cannot seek justice when they are actually hurt
or exploited.

How to bring about Consumer Awareness?

Consumers are largely denied their due rights, especially in developing countries such as India.
The consumers are spread widely all over a country and are poor, illiterate and are generally not
aware of their rights, though their awareness has recently increased. The manufacturers and
suppliers of goods or services often exploit consumers by adopting a number of unfair and
restrictive trade practices. They often merge and also form tacit cartels to raise prices for
maximising their profits at the expense of consumers.

For instance, in case of drugs manufacturers generally charge high prices which are much above
their cost of production. Some pharmaceutical companies misuse their patent rights to exploit
consumers. They therefore need protection from unfair and restrictive trade practices of
producers and suppliers of goods or services.

Consumer forums or consumer protection councils are organizations that help represent
consumer interests. They guide consumers in the process of filing complaints in the court when
they are exploited and also help in spreading consumer protection awareness.

Consumer awareness is one of the most persistent problems the government faces when it comes
to consumer protection. To resolve this problem the government has come up with various
methods over the years. In fact, it is the main aim of the Department of Consumer Affairs.

Social movement to protect the consumers from unfair and unhealthy restrictive trade practices
by the manufacturers and suppliers is also called consumerism. An eminent management expert
states, “Consumerism is a social movement seeking to augment the rights and powers of
consumers”. Similarly, Boyd and Allen state, “Consumerism may be defined as the dedication of
those activities of both public and private organisations which are designed to protect individuals
from practices that impinge upon their rights as consumers”.

Important Methods of Consumer Protection:

How to ensure consumer protection from unfair, restrictive, deceptive and exploitative practices
of manufacturers and suppliers?

The important ways for consumer protection are:

1. Imposition of self-regulation and discipline by the manufacturers and suppliers of goods and
services for working in the interests of consumers.
2. The role of government which can enact laws for the protection of consumers and make
arrangements for their enforcement.

3. Voluntary organisation of consumers to form groups such as NGO, cooperative societies to

safeguard the interests of consumers.

Now, there are certain steps that can be followed to spread Consumer Awareness which are as
follows :

• Don’t be afraid of complaining about a product. You need to understand that you have
spent your money and it is the responsibility of the seller to provide you with quality
products and if they fail to do so, you should complain.
• Please ask for a bill from the shopkeeper, it acts as a proof plus it shows that you are an
active citizen who his aware of his rights.
• Law is there to protect you. There are consumer forums to address to all your
problems.
• If your friends have a problem with some product they purchased, you should insist
them to go file a complaint.
• We, the citizens, can form small groups and spread this message either by way of
social media or campaigns.
• Every product provides with a telephone number for feedback. Why not use it? As a
consumer, you should give your feedback to the companies that are manufacturing the
products.

CASE STUDY: DONOGHUE Vs. STEVENSON

On the 26 August, 1928, May Donoghue and a friend were at a café in Glasgow (Scotland).
Donoghue's companion ordered and paid for her drink. The cafe purchased the product from a
distributor that purchased it from Stevenson. The ginger beer came in a Dark bottle, and the
contents were not visible from the outside. Donoghue drank some of the contents and her friend
lifted the bottle to pour the remainder of the ginger beer into the tumbler. The remains of a snail
in a state of decomposition dropped out of the bottle into the tumbler.
Donoghue could not sue Stevenson for breach of contract because she had not purchased the
drink herself. Instead, Donoghue’s lawyers claimed that Stevenson had breached a duty of care
to his consumers and caused injury through negligence. the case established that manufacturers
have a duty of care to the end consumers or users of their products. According to Lord Atkin, the
judge, “a manufacturer of products, which he sells to reach the ultimate consumer in the form in
which they left him… owes a duty to the consumer to take reasonable care”. This precedent has
evolved and now forms the basis of laws that protect consumers from contaminated or faulty
goods. These protections began as common law but many have since been codified in legislation.

It was finally held that, Manufacturers owe the final consumer of their product a duty of care (at
least in the instance where the goods cannot be inspected between manufacturing and
consumption). There need not be a contractual relationship, or privity, in order for the final
consumer to sue in negligence.

The Consumer Protection Act, 1986 and several other laws like the Weights, Standards &
Measures Act can be formulated to make sure that there is fair competition in the market and free
flow of correct information from goods and services providers to the ones who consume them. In
fact, the degree of consumer protection in any country is regarded as the right indicator of the
progress of the country.There is high level of phistication gained by the goods and services
providers in their marketing and selling practices and different types of promotional tasks viz.
advertising resulted in an increasing requirement for more consumer areness and protection. The
government of India has realized the condition of Indian consumers therefore the Ministry of
Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution has incorporated the Department of Consumer
Affairs as the nodal organization to protect the consumer rights, redress the consumer grievances
and promote the standards governing goods and services provided in India. If there is
infringement of rights of consumer then a complaint can be made under the following
circumstances and reported to the close by designated

consumer court:

The goods or services purchased by a person or agreed to be purchased by a person has one or
more defects or deficiencies in any respect
A trader or a service provider resort to unfair or restrictive practices of trade

A trader or a service provider if charges a price more than the price displayed on the goods or the
price that was agreed upon between the parties or the price that was stipulated under any law that
exist

Goods or services that bring a hazard to the safety or life of a person offered for sale,
unknowingly or knowingly, that cause injury to health, safety or life.