Gold investment has been a popular option for people in India for centuries. Gold is considered a symbol of wealth, prosperity, and good fortune in Indian culture, and it is often given as a gift during festivals and special occasions. Physical gold includes buying gold jewellery, coins, and bars. Buyers can purchase these items from banks, jewellery shops, and authorised dealers.
However, investors should be cautious of counterfeit products and ensure that they buy from reputable sellers.
To ensure that authentic and original purchase is made, government has laid down procedures to be followed by stakeholders in the interest of buyers. One such mandate if hallmarked jewellery.
What Is Hallmarking?
As per Bureau of Indian Standards, hallmarking is the accurate determination and official recording of the proportionate content of precious metal in precious metal articles. Hallmarks are thus official marks used in India as a guarantee of purity or fineness of precious metal articles
In India, at present two precious metals namely gold and silver have been brought under the purview of hallmarking.
As per section 49 of BIS Rules, 2018 in case hallmarked jewellery bought by the consumer is found to be of lesser purity than that marked on jewellery, then the buyer/customer shall be entitled for compensation which shall be two times the amount of difference calculated on the basis of shortage of purity for the weight of such article sold and the testing charges.
The 6 digit HUID was introduced from July 01, 2021 and all articles hallmarked post this date have to be hallmarked with HUID only. After introduction of HUID, the hallmark consisted of 3 marks viz, BIS logo, purity of the article and six-digit alphanumeric HUID. Each hallmarked article has a unique HUID number which is traceable.
A consumer can check and authenticate hallmarked gold jewellery items with HUID number using ‘verify HUID’ in the BIS CARE app which is available in both android as well as iOS. It provides information of the jeweller who got the article hallmarked, their registration number, purity of the article, type of article as well as details of hallmarking centre which test and hallmarked the article.
Using this information a common consumer can verify the article being purchased by matching it with article type as well as its purity.
This was about hallmarked jewellery, however, even if you have unhallmarked old gold jewellery, you can check its purity. A common consumer can get the purity of their unhallmarked gold jewellery tested at any of the BIS recognised Assaying and Hallmarking Centres (AHCs).
The AHCs undertake the testing of gold jewellery from common consumers on priority and provide a test report to the consumer.
The test report issued to the consumer will assure the consumer about the purity of their jewellery and will also be useful if the consumer wishes to sell the jewellery lying with him.
Gold Purity Test Charges
The charges for testing of gold jewellery upto 4 articles is Rs 200. For 5 or more articles, the charges are Rs 45 per article.
After paying testing charges of Rs. 200 to any of BIS recognised AH centres. The list of BIS recognised AH centres is available at BIS website www.bis.gov.in under the hallmarking tab.
Some of the guidelines on testing of old gold jewellery and artefacts of the consumer by the Assaying and Hallmarking Centres are given below;
- Consumers can bring one or multiple pieces of jewellery lying with them for testing to BIS recognised AHC.
- The lot brought by the consumer upto 10 pieces may be considered as a mixed lot and tested as per the provisions of mixed lots mentioned in the IS 15820: 2009.
- The jewellery brought by the consumer shall be weighed in the presence of the consumer.
Consumers can check detailed guidelines here
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