In two big initiatives to promote sale of pure gold, Government on Wednesday cut licence fee for gold hallmarking by up to 87.5 per cent for jewellers in small towns and launched a system for giving a unique identification number for each jewellery with purity certification.
The current licence fee is Rs 20,000 for three years for all jewellers across the country. After reduction, the licence fee will be Rs 2,500 for three years for jewellers in small towns with a population of less than three lakh.
For jewellers located in towns having a population of 3-10 lakh, the fee is Rs 5,000 for three years. The license fee has been drastically reduced to promote hallmarking of gold, which is voluntary in nature at present.
Gold hallmarking is a purity certification of precious metals. The Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS), under the Consumer Affairs Ministry, is the administrative authority of hallmarking.
Announcing these measures, Food and Consumer Affairs Minister K V Thomas said: "Hallmarking of gold is not compulsory at present.We have reduced the licence fee because jewellers from smaller towns were not coming forward to take licence for hallmarking due to high fee."
He said BIS would introduce a unique identification number on each gold jewellery weighing more than 10 grams to protect consumers from unscrupulous jewellers. This would help ensure traceability of jewellery and take action against those who are misusing the purity certification, he added.
THe BIS grants licence to jewellers. The BIS certified jewellers can get their hallmark from 250 assaying centres across the country. Hallmarking is the accurate determination and official recording of the proportionate content of precious metal in articles. It is to protect the public against adulteration.