State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission
Devi vs Zonal Deputy Tahsildar on 30 October, 2023
Daily Order IN THE TAMIL NADU STATE CONSUMER DISPUTES REDRESSAL COMMISSION, CHENNAI. Present: Hon'ble Thiru Justice R.SUBBIAH ... PRESIDENT Revision Petition No.105 of 2023 (Against the Order dated 12.06.2023 passed in CMP No.52/2023 in C.C. No.215/2022 on the file of the DCDRC, Tiruvannamalai) Orders pronounced on :30.10.2023 Devi, D/o. Mr. Chinnapaiyan, No.246, Kulathumettu Street, Kanji (Village and Post), Chengam Taluk, Tiruvannamalai - 606 702. ... Revision Petitioner / Petitioner / Complainant. Vs. The Zonal Deputy Tahsildar, Taluk Office, Chengam, Tiruvannamalai - 606 701. ... Respondent / Respondent / Opposite party. For Revision Petitioner / Petitioner / Complainant : M/s. V. Narasimma Moorthy For Respondent / Respondent / Opposite party : M/s. K. Kumaran This Revision Petition has been filed by the Revision Petitioner / Petitioner / Complainant to set aside the order in CMP No.52/2023 in C.C. No.215/2022 and came up for final hearing on 30.10.2023 and after hearing the arguments of the counsel for respondent and after perusing the materials on record and having stood over for consideration till this date, this Commission passes the following:- O R D E R (Open Court)
R.Subbiah, J. - President.
In the above Revision Petition, challenge is to the Order, dated 12.06.2023, passed by the DCDRC, Tiruvannamalai, in CMP No.52 of 2023 in C.C. No.215 of 2022, declining to accede to the plea of the petitioner/complainant for a direction to the respondent/Opposite party to produce certain documents connected to issuance of Community Certificate by the OP to the complainant.
2. From a perusal of the impugned order and the other materials made available, it could be seen that, while the grievance of the petitioner herein in the main C.C. filed by her before the District Commission is that the return of her application applied to the OP for issuance of Community Certificate is an instance of service deficiency, in the CMP filed by her, she sought for production of certain e-records filed in her earlier Application and, according to her, the reason assigned by the District Commission for dismissing the CMP that the e-papers sought to be produced have nothing to decide the issue on hand is wholly untenable.
3. It seems, by way of procuring a positive order in the consumer complaint, the petitioner/complainant wants to get community certificate directly from the OP whose stand is that, in the wake of complaints from the members of public about various irregularities & involvement of brokers in the matter of issuing community certificates, nativity certificates, income-certificates, etc, the applicants seeking issuance of such certificates have been duly instructed to firstly approach the concerned VAOs/Revenue Inspectors, who alone can conduct a ground-level enquiry about the genuineness of the claim based on which only the application could be decided; while so, despite knowing such state of affairs very well, the complainant has directly approached the OP for the issuance of Community Certificate and her Application was duly returned with a clear advice to approach the VAO or the RI concerned and hence, there is no scope for any service deficiency in involved.
4. We are at a loss to understand as to how the grievance of the complainant over the return of her application by the revenue authority/Tahsildar for issuance of community certificate has relevance or cause of action to launch a consumer dispute. In other words, in the absence of any consumer - service provider relationship between the parties or involvement of consideration for availing the service which are the basic pre-requisites for raising a consumer dispute, decisions of revenue or quasi-judicial authorities and the rules & regulations made by such authorities from time to time in order to regulate the matters governing issuance of certificates cannot be brought for questioning or adjudication in consumer proceedings. As such, the complainant cannot expect the Consumer Commissions to direct the statutory authority concerned to issue to her a community certificate by holding that the act of such authority/OP in returning her application with an advice to primarily approach the designated authorities at the ground-level for due verification of her claim is an instance of service deficiency. It must be re-stated once again that the regulations made by the revenue authorities to check and curb the irregularities complained of in the matter of issuing various certificates shall have to be duly abide by the applicants and, if they have any grievance against those regulations, the course open is to approach the appropriate court only and there is no point in rushing to the Consumer Fora that are supposed to deal only with consumer matters and not any dispute or grievance arising from the decisions of the revenue/quasi judicial authorities. In that view of the matter, we find no reason to accede to the plea of the revision petitioner.
5. In the result, the Revision Petition is dismissed as bereft of any merit with a direction to the District Commission to dispose of the main C.C. in the light of the observations made above.
R.SUBBIAH, J.
PRESIDENT.
ISM/TNSCDRC/Chennai/Orders/OCTOBER/2023.