Centre has announced that it has made hallmarking of gold mandatory. Hallmarking shall be done at the first point of sale which may be manufacturer, whole-seller, distributor or retailer.
Moreover, alteration in the hallmarked jewellery up to 2 grams of increase or decrease will be allowed with responsibility of purity on the jeweller.
Many jewellers across India are hailing the government’s decision. As the mandatory hallmarking will standardize the purity of gold jewellery and take the industry a long way towards being more structured. It will also push the ongoing shift of business and customers from the unorganized to the organized jewellery segment.
Gold hallmarking
This hallmarking scheme has started with 256 districts of India. These all are assaying and hallmarking centres. As per the government, there has been 25 per cent increase every year in assaying and hallmarking centres in the last five years.
Presently, 943 assaying and hallmarking centres are operational in India. Furthermore, jewellers with annual turnover up to Rs 40 lakh will be exempted from mandatory hallmarking. Watches, fountain pens and special types of jewellery like Kundan, Polki and Jadau don’t fall under this category.
Export and re-import of jewellery as per Trade Policy of Government of India, Jewellery for international exhibitions, jewellery for government-approved B2B domestic exhibitions will not be hallmarked.
As per the government order, any manufacturer, importer, wholesaler, distributor or retailer engaged in selling precious metal articles has to mandatorily get registered with the BIS.
The registration process will be one-time and there will be no fees. Artisans or manufacturers who are manufacturing the gold jewellery on job work basis for the jewellers and are not directly related to sale to anyone in the chain are exempted for registration.
One also also sell the old un-hallmarked jewellery available in households. Jewellers can continue to buy back old gold jewellery without hallmark from consumer.
Hallmarking of gold will enable jewellery buyers to make the right choice. And it will also save them from any unnecessary confusion while buying gold.
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