BIS raids hallmarking pick up centre in Zaveri Bazaar

Seizes huge quantity of forged hallmarked jewellery

In an operation conducted jointly by the office of the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) and the Mumbai Police, a large quantity of forged hallmarked jewellery was recovered from a pick up centre of jewellery hallmarking in Zaveri Bazaar here today.

Normally, small jewellers assign the hallmarking job to some private and individual consultants on commission basis called pick up. Such pick ups collect jewellery from the manufacturers and deliver them back after hallmarking. Large and organised sector jewellers, however, do hallmarking on their own.

This is perhaps the first raid on such a large scale by the BIS on jewellers since hallmarking guidelines were implemented on January 1, 2017.

Since the hallmarking was confined to gold ornaments with only types of purity levels - 22ct, 18ct and 14ct - there has been a rapid shift in business from authorised hallmarking centres to unauthorised ones.

According to trade sources, the police acted on a tip off from some jewellers in Zaveri Bazaar early Wednesday and entered the hallmarking centre's office by 2 pm. The actual quantity and value of seized gold jewellery was not immediately ascertained.

To eradicate illicit money from the trade, various agencies including the Enforcement Directorate and local police have been conducting raids on jewellers across the country since the demonetisation of high value currency notes announced on November 8, 2016.