Quality and Standards in India
Building a Culture of Quality
How India can balance safety, trade and costs in its quality system, and a recap of the module.
A strong quality infrastructure supports safe products, trust and exports.
Balance
- Protect consumers from unsafe products.
- Avoid unnecessary barriers on inputs.
- Support small firms with testing and subsidies.
- Enforce consistently.
Priorities
- More testing labs in smaller cities.
- Faster certification for foreign and domestic firms.
- Strong drug and food regulators.
- Consumer awareness through apps like BIS Care.
Module recap
- Standards solve information asymmetry.
- BIS certifies products with the ISI mark.
- QCOs expanded rapidly; some input QCOs were rolled back in 2025.
- Gold hallmarking with HUID became mandatory in 2021.
- FSSAI regulates food safety; adulteration persists.
- Legal metrology ensures fair measures.
- Cough syrup deaths exposed drug quality gaps.
- Recalls and product liability push firms to fix defects.
- Testing labs underpin standards.
- Standards can act as trade barriers.
- ZED helps MSMEs upgrade quality.
The quality chain
A small toy maker gets BIS certification, sells safe toys at home and uses the same quality to win export orders abroad.
Thinking quality rules only add costs
They build trust, safety and export competitiveness.
Key takeaways
- Quality infrastructure supports safety, trust and exports.
- Balance protection with avoiding input barriers.
- Testing capacity and enforcement are priorities.
- Consumer awareness helps enforcement.
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