Every right has its corresponding duty: Hushili

Dimapur, March 15 (MExN): The Legal Monitoring & Consumer Protection Dimapur today observed the World Consumer Rights’ Day at Lotha Hoho Ki in Dimapur. 

Addressing the gathering Deputy Commissioner of Dimapur N Hushili Sema, who is also the chairman of District Consumer Protection Council Dimapur and District & Session Judge S Hukato Swu, who is also the president of District Consumer Redressal Forum, Dimapur were the main speakers of today’s programme.

The Deputy Commissioner emphasised that every consumer ought to know one’s rights as well as to be responsible for one’s duties. “Every right has its corresponding duty. We have to know our rights but side by side we need to know out duty.” However, most of the time people tend to forget the duties and violate the rights. She also pointed out that youngsters are far better than the adults. Stating that youngsters are more aware of civic sense. Also, she suggested that more civil societies and officials from different government departments should participate in such programmes. 

District & Session Judge spoke on rights and duties of consumers. He said lobby of the business community is very strong in Nagaland. They have the attitude of ‘take it or leave it’. Consumers are left at the mercy of the business community. He took the example of the butchers in Nagaland and the way they treat the customers. He said that according to the recent statistics, in “India Rs 1000 crores is defrauded from the consumers for faulty weights and errors”.

Elaborating more on the subject he took the example of last year’s incident where a consumer sued FMCG company, which owns the Axe brand for ‘cheating’ and causing him ‘mental suffering’. The advertisement of the Axe brand was misleading. In regard to the Nagaland Liquor Total Prohibition Act (NLTP) Act 1989, Swu said that it is “useless” because traders are making money out of it. 

Earlier, a bottle of rum cost Rs 60 but after the act it was hiked to Rs 200. “...traders, they will create artificial scarcity to shoot up the price”, he added. He also said that there are traders who take advantage of the “underground tax”. He called upon the gathering not to blame only the “undergrounds” for price rise in the market since some traders use it as an excuse to hike price abnormally. He also explained on how to file a case in the consumer court and the norms to be followed.