PRODUCT LIABILITY ACTION: A TOOTH TO STRENGTHEN CONSUMER PROTECTION

As the world shifts to technological advancements, the advent of e-commerce marks its peak, particularly in India, where it has been earmarked as the fastest growing market with an annual growth rate of 51%. While these developments are an important part of globalization, a few challenges come along. Issues like unfair contracts, privacy, data protection, faulty goods, refund or return remained unaddressed as the earlier existing Consumer Protection Act, 1986 did not elucidate on the same. Given the above, the Law Commission of India had recommended that a separate law be enacted for better consumer protection. Based on the recommendations of the Law Commission of India, The Consumer Protection Bill, 2019, was introduced in Lok Sabha by the Minister of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution on July 8, 2019. The said Bill received presidential assent on August 9 2019,and came into force on July 20 2020. This Article seeks to analyse the provisions on product liability in the Consumer Protection Act 2019. To analyse the development of product liability, Part 1 of this paper deals with the historical development of product liability jurisprudence in the USA, which traces the changes in the underlying rationale behind product liability. Part 2 of this paper highlights the global best practices and gives an overview of product liability by analysing the product liability laws in numerous foreign jurisdictions. Part 3 provides an analysis of the development of product liability in India and an explanation of the provisions of product liability in the CPA 2019 by explaining the relevant terms using case laws and illustrations. Finally, this paper concludes with a summary of the paper, which is helpful for other jurisditions considering product liability law reforms in an increasingly globalized and digital economy and draws on comparisons with regulatory regimes and issues