In this group of writ petitions, Prudential Capital Markets Limited (PCML), Calcutta is the petitioner. In all the petitions they prayed for a writ of prohibition, prohibiting the District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum (hereafter called ‘the District Forum’) or the State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission (hereafter called the State Commission), from entertaining any complaint or petition from the respondent-depositor (hereafter called ‘the depositor’) and further declare that it is only the Company Law Board (CLB) which can entertain a complaint against PCML.

2. There are three categories of cases. The first category of cases are those where the depositor filed a consumer dispute case before the competent District Forum for refund of the deposit made by the depositor with the PCML and on the District Forum allowing the application, the petitioner herein approached the State Commission which dismissed the appeal filed and whereupn depositor approached District Forum under Section 27(1) of the Consumer Protection Act, 1986 (hereafter called ‘the Consumer Act’) by filing penalty petition. The second category of cases are those where the depositor filed a penalty petition