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The statistics thrown around in the rural marketing world for consumer goods are impressive, to say the least.
In terms of market share, rural India consumes 50 per cent of the washing soap, tooth powder, TV, fans, bicycles, wrist watches, blades, and 38 per cent of all two-wheelers produced.
A MART survey once found that the rural consumer buys 46 per cent of all soft drinks, 49 per cent of motorcycles and 59 per cent of cigarettes, and almost 11 per cent of rural women use lipstick. Around 24 per cent even have insurance policies.
So, while every company competes with the other to woo the rural consumer, is anyone out there to protect this buyer from fraud or grievances in terms of adulteration, shortfall in weights and measures, or quality of product?
Apparently not, as pointed out by George Cheriyan, head of CUTS Centre for Consumer Action, Research & Training in his paper “Rural Consumers and Role of Local Bodies in Consumer Protection”. He points out that the three-tier consumer forums set up under the Indian Consumer Protection Act (CoPRA) 1986 are in urban areas. “This makes it difficult for rural consumers to approach the forum. ”
The Web-based system for lodging complaints is not effective as only 6.9 per cent of the Indian population uses the internet.
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