Safety of Toys is under compulsory Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) certification from 1st Jan 2021 according to the Toys (Quality Control) Order, 2020 issued by the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) under Section 16 of the BIS Act, 2016. The Toys QCO shall apply to (Toys) Product or material designed or clearly intended, whether or not exclusively, for use in play by children under 14 years of age or any other product as notified by the Central Government from time to time. Accordingly, it is compulsory for toys to conform to the corresponding Indian Standards for Safety of Toys and to bear Bureau of Indian Standards Standard Mark under a license from BIS as per Scheme-I of Schedule-II of BIS (Conformity Assessment) Regulations, 2018.
As per this Quality Control Order, read with Section 17 of the BIS Act, no person shall manufacture, import, distribute, sell, hire, lease, store or exhibit for sale any toys without the ISI mark as per this QCO read with the BIS Act, 2016. Under the BIS Product Certification Scheme i.e. Scheme-I of Schedule –II of the BIS (Conformity Assessment) Regulations, 2018, License is granted to manufacturing units to use the Standard Mark on the product as per the relevant Indian Standards. Accordingly, Toy manufacturing units including foreign manufacturing units exporting toys to India are required to obtain BIS license for safety of toys. Violations are punishable with fine and/or imprisonment under BIS Act, 2016.
BIS acts upon the complaints related to violation of Quality Control Orders of Toys by certain manufacturers/sellers/importers etc. Action on these complaints involves discreet investigation for verification of genuineness of information followed by Search and Seizure and launch of prosecution against the offender for violation of provisions of BIS Act, 2016. Apart from this, proactive enforcement to prevent violation of Quality Control Orders of Toys is also done through market surveillance activities by BIS Branch/Regional Offices.
Details of Search and Seizure Operations carried out by BIS to ensure implementation of Toys Quality Control Order 2020 are as under:
Year | Search and Seizure Operations conducted |
2021-22 | 40 |
2022-23 | 74 |
2023-24 (up to 11th December 2023) | 12 |
As per the provisions of BIS Product Certification Scheme, BIS grants license to manufacturing units to use BIS Standard Mark (ISI Mark) on their product based on assessment of their capability to produce toys according to the Indian Standards through factory visit(s) and testing of product as per Indian Standards. BIS also conducts market and factory surveillance to ensure that the ISI marked toys available to the consumers are conforming to the Indian Standards, under which samples of toys are drawn from the manufacturing unit(s) (factories) and from the market and tested in BIS Labs and BIS Recognized Labs according to the Indian Standards.
