Among its achievements CERC listed was the Jagrut Grahak Gram Project it took up in Rajpar village of Wadhwan taluka in Surendranagar. The CERC "adopted" this village to make it aware of its rights as consumers and the mentoring helped them ward off fraud calls, it said.
The Gujarat government is working on a way to bring the service providers and service receivers on one platform through intervention of agencies such as Consumer Education and Research Centre (CERC), Principal Secretary (Food, Civil Supplies and Consumer Affairs) Mona Khandhar said on Tuesday, citing the example of the IndiGo flight disruptions. She was speaking at an event hosted by the CERC to mark National Consumer day that falls on December 24.
“One very important thing is the Indigo (flights) glitch that we all experienced. We have seen its span… it was a sheer duopoly or market monopoly related issue and the passengers or consumers of their service, the way they were put to hardship, we all have seen…”.
Khandhar said that it was necessary to identify areas where the consumer or receiver of service was “vulnerable” like in cases of monopolies, or duopolies or an upcoming sector where regulation was still in process.
She urged consumer fora to step in to fill the gaps to protect the receivers and consumers of services and emphasised on the ‘pre-litigation services’ provided by such bodies.
“The push from the government side is that these consumer fora should select important areas such as education, health services, pharmaceuticals, medical devices…and we have to look for wherever there is monopoly or duopoly or where the regulatory framework is in the process of being formulated and there we need to be in support of consumers and service receivers and ensure there is a balance,” Khandhar said.
She listed packaged and processed food products, pharmaceuticals or medical equipment, education and medical services as some of the important areas where such intervention was required as it would “affect a large community of students and health service seekers”.