General public not much aware how to ensure the purity of gold. It is very difficult to get pure gold from a jewellery shop. Even big jewellers will not give 22 carat/ 23 carat gold ornament even if they are claiming their ornaments are pure gold of 22/23 carat respectively. Customers are cheated in different method. Most people claim that gold is a best investment. But if we want to sell our ornament, we dont get actual value. Firstly, they deduct the making charges, the selling and buying prices are different that varies from 5-20 percent depending upon the knowledge and power of the customer.
The gold consumption in India is increasing day by day. Therefore the jewelleries also mushrooming. On the customers point of view, there is no standardization of prices in jewellery. The other problem is that making charges varies depend upon the jewellery shop. Even if the jewellery owners claim that their jewellery contain different carats, people have no knowledge how to check the carat of the jewellery, where it can be checked, etc. The jewelers claim of Hall mark/ BIS standard/ 912 etc. it is very difficult to identify the purity of gold. Anybody can forge hallmark/912 mark on the jewellery. Today getting good jewellery/ gold at a fair price becomes Herculean task for the customers. On the other hand, if we want to sell our gold ornaments, they look very suspiciously about the purity of gold. When we buy a gold from a jeweller’s shop, we consumer never show mistrust to the jewellers. If we want to sell the same gold, they look suspiciously that whether the gold is pure or not. We need to put in place a scientific tamperproof instrument for checking the purity of gold and also need an authority to check the gold’s valuation, purity etc. under govt. control so that consumer should not feel cheated when they buy gold.
Therefore the State and central government need to put in place some regulatory mechanism to prevent the malpractices in this sector and more say on the part of consumers through standardization of procedure like buying and selling prices, making charges of different jewelleries, purity test and ensure purity of gold etc. This is the one of the prime sector where there is gross manipulation is going on and the people can be duped easily in every segment of people who are finding it difficult to put their grievance before any regulatory body etc. The govt. must maintain like a Euro/ International standard on gold sector also in regulating the jewellery sector and must phase out by making a ban on selling low carat jewellery through all licence jewellery shop. We must keep our gold standard at par with international standard so that Indian jewellery can buy and sell at a stable price any part of India or any International market. It can be possible only if the jewellery makers and govt. take interest in maintaining Euro or International standard.
Indian gold cannot be sold at international market/ at the market price. We need standardisation of gold at par with international standard. We have opened our economy, the gold reserve is made alternative to Indian currency, hence standardisation and purity of gold is very much necessary in the days to come. We need a greater consumer awareness and consumer movement in India. For anything and everything govt. try to legislate and make a law for their convenience, why the govt. hesitate to make a law in this issue for the protection of large consumers in India.
Let us all hope that govt. must positively respond on this issue.