Gold hallmarking to be made mandatory in India

India being a signatory to the World Trade Organisation (WTO), it is required to notify the WTO before introducing any mandatory regulation

Post By : IJ News Service On 21 August 2019 10:17 AM

The centre has revived its intention to make hallmarking mandatory for gold jewellery and plans to notify the regulation in WTO in a week time, a top official said.

Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) Director General Surina Rajan, however, assured the jewellery traders that the process would be done in consultation with all stakeholders."The (central) government once again intends to make hallmarking of gold jewellery mandatory in the country. A notification to WTO is expected in a week time to seek comments," she commented.

India being a signatory to the World Trade Organisation (WTO), it is required to notify the WTO before introducing any mandatory regulation. Digitisation of hallmarking would be a "crucial component for making it mandatory". "We have engaged IIT-Mumbai to execute the digitisation programme for gold hallmarking and it will take about a year to complete the system," Rajan said.

The initiative will connect all hallmarking centres with BIS control and a hallmarking code will be generated only after completion of a fool-proof system. Currently, there are about 800 hallmarking centres across the country and only 40 per cent of jewellery is hallmarked. Rajan also assured jewellery sector that barring any major criminal conspiracy, the BIS does not want to exercise its authority to arrest, search and seizures.

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