Government issues notice to Amazon, Flipkart for not abiding by the rule of displaying product's 'country of origin'

The government has issued notices to ecommerce platforms like Amazon and Flipkart as they have failed to follow Centre’s rule to display a product’s 'country of origin'. The government has asked the ecommerce platforms to explain within 15 days why action should not be taken against them for not displaying country of origin on the products on offer. In July this year, the government asked all ecommerce platforms to display country of origin by September 30.

As per the Department of Consumer Affairs, Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution, this is a violation of its rules. It is punishable with a fine of up to Rs 25,000 for the first offence. For repeated violations, the penalty is up to Rs 50,000 or imprisonment. The department stated in the notice that some e-tailers are yet to display the country of origin details.

"It has been brought into notice that some of the e-commerce entities are not displaying the mandatory declaration on digital platforms required under the Legal Metrology (Packaged Commodities) Rules, 2011," said one of the similarly worded notices.

According to the notices sent to Flipkart India and Amazon Development Centre India, they are e-commerce entities and therefore, have to ensure that all mandatory declarations should be displayed on the digital and electronic network used for ecommerce transactions.

Uniform Resource Locators (URL) for products listed on the websites were also included in the notices. The notice invoked multiple rules and said that every individual who manufactures or pre-packs or imports any pre-packaged commodity for sale is required to be registered with the Director or Controller of Legal Metrology. "Therefore, it is directed to submit a copy of the registration certificate issued under Rule 27 of the Legal Metrology (Packaged Commodities) Rules 2011," it said.