The National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission must respect concurrent findings of lower forums unless there is a legal error or jurisdictional flaw, underscoring limited revisional power.

ORDER

Binoy Kumar, Presiding Member

1. This is a batch of 126 Revision Petitions, out of which 63 Revision Petitions have been filed by IFFCO- MC Crop Science Private Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as the Petitioner/ IFFCO-MC) and the rest cross 63 Revision Petitions have been filed by the Complainants/Farmers under Section 21 (b) of the Consumer Protection Act, 1986 (for short ‘the Act’) against the respective Orders of the Rajasthan State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission (hereinafter referred to as State Commission) dated 20.09.2022, wherein its Appeal was partly allowed with the modification in the respective Orders of the District Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission, Bikaner (hereinafter referred to as the District Commission) of these Revision Petitions viz. RP/892/2023, RP/893/2023 & RP/1469/2023 have been wrongly listed. Both the State Commission and the District Commission Orders are concurrent to the extent that they have held the Farmer(s)/Complainant(s) eligible for receiving the compensation in view of the crop loss suffered by them.

2. Aggrieved by the Order of the State Commission, both the Petitioner and the Complainant, have filed the present Revision Petition before this Commission, which vide its common Order dated 26.03.2024 ordered the Petitioner/ IFFCO-MC to pay compensation from the date of the Complaint (s).

3. The Petitioner, aggrieved by the Order of this Commission dated 26.03.2024, filed various Writ Petitions before the Rajasthan High Court, which allowed the writ petitions setting aside this Commission’s Order and remanded the matter to this Commission to be heard by a Division Bench.

4. We are clubbing all 123 Revision Petitions together, as the facts, grievances and the legal issues involved are identical, with the only distinction being the difference in the area.

Therefore, for the sake of convenience, RP No.832 of 2023 is taken as the lead case.

5. The brief facts of the case are that the Complainants, who are farmers, own agricultural land cultivated groundnut on 56 bighas of land in Kharif 2016. Respondent No.2/ M/s Agri Care and the Petitioner are manufacturer and marketer of pesticides and fertilizers, while Respondent No. 3 is a Village Service Co-operative Society that sells these products. The Respondent No.2 and Petitioner promoted their product “Yamato Carbendazim 50% WP” through village meetings and wide publicity campaigns, assuring farmers of healthy crops and protection from diseases. Relying on these assurances, the Complainants purchased the fungicides Yamato from Respondent No. 3 and used it as instructed during the sowing of groundnut. However, after sowing, only 30-40% of the seeds germinated, and even those plants were destroyed after the first irrigation, leading to complete crop failure. The Complainants found that other farmers in the village who used the same fungicides faced similar destruction of their crops. A complaint was submitted to local authorities, and a spot inspection was conducted, confirming the crop damage. The matter was also taken up with various government authorities. The Directorate of Plant Protection, Quarantine, and Storage, under the Ministry of Agriculture, found Respondents No. 2 and Petitioner guilty of misleading farmers and recommended legal action. The Complainants incurred Rs.20,000 per bigha for sowing, totalling Rs.11,20,000/-, and suffered an estimated crop loss of 280 quintals of groundnut worth Rs.7,59,600/-. Aggrieved by the acts of Petitioner and Respondents, the Complainant filed the present complaint before the District Commission, seeking the following reliefs:-

“Therefore, by presenting the complaint, it is requested that the Complainant should be ordered to get the claim (compensation amounting to Rs. 19,89,600/- Rupees Nineteen Lakh Eighty Nine Thousand Six Hundred Rupees along with interest @12% p.a. and other reliefs as court deemed fit in favour of the Complainant.”

6. The Respondent No.2 is the manufacturer of the fungicide