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Judgment
V.K.Jain, J.
The complainants/respondents purchased 180 Kgs of Gwar seeds from the petitioner. The seeds were sown by them in their respective agricultural land but the crop was not upto mark. The said seeds had been manufactured by respondent no. 2 and according to the complainants, they were assured by the petitioner that the seeds would give proper yield of 8 to10 quintals per acre. This is also the case of the complainants that while sowing the seeds, they had followed proper instructions and procedure and had taken due care and precautions required for the said crop. They also claim that they had prepared the fields ploughing them three times in order to get better yield. On complaints made by the complainants to the Agriculture Department, an inspection was carried out by their team on 26.09.2012 and they found the plants to be of different variety. About 60-70% of the plants had high growth without any fruits. Being aggrieved from the financial loss suffered by them on account of insufficient yield, the complainants approached the concerned District Forum by way of two separate Consumer Complaints.
The complaints were resisted by the petitioner which claimed that there was no defect in the seeds sold to the complainants. It was also alleged that no notice of the inspection was received by them from Agriculture Department which was in violation of the directions contained in the letter dated 03.01.2002 issued by Department of Agriculture, Haryana.
The District Forum having dismissed the complaints, the complainants approached the concerned State Commission by way of two separate appeals. Vide impugned order dated 23.10.2017, the State Commission allowed the appeals relying upon several decisions of this Commission. In RP/912/2018, the petitioner was directed to pay Rs.30,000/- as compensation alongwith Rs.11,000/- for mental harassment and the cost of litigation quantified at Rs.5,500/-. In RP/913/2018, the petitioner was directed to pay Rs.1,20,000/- as compensation alongwith Rs.21,000/- for mental harassment and the cost of litigation quantified at Rs.11,000/-. Being aggrieved from the aforesaid order, the petitioner is before this Commission by way of these two revision petitions.
The emphasis of the arguments advanced by the learned counsel for the petitioner is that despite circular dated 03.01.2002, the Agriculture Department did not associate representative of the Seed Agency and the Scientists of KGK/KVK,HAU in the inspection carried out by it on the request of the complainants. This is her contention that no reliance can be placed on the report prepared at the back of the petitioner without any notice to it. She also points out that no particulars of the field inspected by the said team such as Khasra number etc. have been given in the inspection report and therefore, the identity of the field inspected by the Agriculture Department cannot be verified. She also submits that the seeds were duly certified by Haryana State Seed Certification Agency vide certificate dated 28.03.2012. However, in the absence of the invoices, the lot number and class of seeds mentioned in the aforesaid certificate cannot be compared with the class of seeds and lot number of the seeds sold to the complainants.
In Reliance Life Sciences Pvt. Ltd. Vs. Umesh Singh Chandan Singh Saddiwal & Anr. and connected cases RP Nos.1033, 1034, 1037, 1038 and 1039 of 2015 decided on 14.01.2016, this Commission inter-alia held as under:
As far as the circulars issued by the Government of Maharashtra are concerned, the said circulars do not indicate as to what was the source of the power in exercise of which the said circulars were issued. The said circulars do not purport to have been issued under a provision of the Seeds Act or the Rules framed thereunder. Even if it is presumed that the aforesaid circulars have been issued under the provisions of the Seeds Act or the rules framed thereunder, the failure to follow the said procedure cannot be fatal to a complaint, filed under the provisions of the Consumer Protection Act. Hence, the failure of the Seed Inspector or for that matter District Level Enquiry Committee, to follow the said procedure, cannot lead to dismissal of a Consumer Complaint, if the complainant is otherwise able to prove his case. In this regard, we cannot be oblivious to the fact that there is no way a farmer can compel the seed inspector or the committee to follow the procedure prescribed in the Seeds Rules or the rules framed in circulars, if any, issued thereunder. There will be no justification for penalizing the farmer for such a failure on the part of the Seed Inspector or the committee.
In this behalf, the following observations of the Hon'ble Supreme Court in Maharashtra Hybrid Seeds Co. Ltd. Vs. Alavalapati Chandra Reddy& Ors. (1998) 6 SCC 738 are also apposite:-
"...........Moreover, if the opposite parties have disputed that the seeds were not defective they would have applied to the District Forum to send the samples of seeds from the said batch for analysis by appropriate laboratory. But the opposite parties have not chosen to file any application for sending the seeds to any laboratory. Since it is probable that the complainants have sown all the seeds purchased by them, they were not in a position to send seeds for analysis. In these circumstances, the order of the District Forum is not vitiated by the circumstance that it has not on its own accord sent the seeds for analysis by an appropriate laboratory."
The learned counsel for the petitioners assailed the report of the committee on the ground that the prior notice of the inspection was not served upon the petitioner, the notice having been sent by ordinary post on 27.05.2008 and since the inspection was carried out on 31.5.2008, the said notice was not even received by the petitioner. The report was also assailed on the ground that it had not been signed by all the members of the committee. As noted earlier, the failure to follow the procedure prescribed under the circulars issued by the Government of Maharashtra will not be fatal to the complainants in a consumer complaint, if he is otherwise able to prove that the seeds purchased by him were defective. Therefore, even the inspection carried out in the absence of the representative of the petitioner committee could be taken into consideration by the fora below though it can hardly be disputed that the inspection report would have been considered to be more authentic, had the representative of the petitioner company been present at the time of inspection.
As far as the identity of the field inspected by the team of Agriculture Department is concerned, there could be no reason for the complainants to take the said team to the field of some other person nor would any other person allow the complainants to project his field as the field of the complainants.
For the reasons stated hereinabove, I see no reason not to rely upon the inspection report prepared by the three officers of the Agriculture Department who found that there was no flower and foliage in as many as 60-70% of the plant growth. As noted earlier, according to the complainants, they had taken all precautions and even ploughed the fields three times in order to get optimum yield. Even otherwise, a farmer purchases the seeds for the purpose of having adequate yield and therefore, he would naturally make best efforts to ensure that the yield does not suffer on account of any deficiency on his part. He has a vested interest in having adequate yield from the seeds sown by him in the fields.
If despite all efforts made by the farmer, there is no flower and foliage in as many as 60-70% of the plants, it is obvious that there was some adulteration in the seeds. The team of the Agriculture Department also noted in this regard that there was a mixture of gwar seeds shown to it. Therefore, I see no reason to discard the report prepared by the officers of the Agriculture Department. The view taken by the State Commission therefore, does not call for any interference by this Commission in exercise of its revisional jurisdiction. The revision petitions, being devoid of any merits, are therefore, dismissed.