Bill to allow govt to standardise more goods, svcs moved in LS

A bill to enable the government to standardise more products, systems and services and establish the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) as a national body was introduced in the Lok Sabha today.
Once the Bureau of Indian Standards Bill, 2015, which was introduced by Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution Minister Ram Vilas Paswan, becomes an Act, the government proposes to repeal the existing BIS Act.
It seeks to enable the central government to bring more products, systems and services under the ambit of standardisation.
The bill also proposes to empower the Centre to authorise any other agency having necessary accreditation for the purpose of conformity assessment against Indian standards.

After becoming law, the bill will allow multiple types of conformity assessment schemes in tunes with global best practices, the statement of objects of the bill stated.
At present, the BIS is not formally recognised as a national standards body of the country, though it has been representing India in various international bodies.

The present BIS Act also does not provide for recall of sub-standard ISI-marked products, hallmarking of precious metal articles, compounding of offenses.
"In view of the increasing significance of standards and conformity assessment systems in the world trade, and to address the aforesaid issues and future challenges in the area, comprehensive amendments are required in the present BIS Act to adequately protect the interests of the consumers.

"Therefore, it is proposed to enact a new legislation and repeal the BIS Act," the statement said.