Saturday, October 19, 2013: Reportedly, the Trade Association of IT (TAIT) is trying hard to ensure that BIS compliance is not made compulsory for IT products under the Compulsory Registration Order 2012 (CRO). The association met senior director, department of electronics and IT, Arun Sachdev regarding the issue. In addition, a TAIT delegation also met Milind Deora, minister of state, IT and Communications to discuss reasons why BIS compliance should not be made compulsory.
Champak Raj Gurjar, executive member, TAIT told crn.in, “We explained them how BIS compliance will lead to monopoly of MNCs and kill local players. Small local manufacturers will not be able to cope with the hefty cost and long winding process of BIS certification. In addition, most IT products are already tested under stringent international standards like UL/TUV/CE/FCC.”
TAIT also demanded an answer why mobile phones were not included under BIS compliance. “Instances of IT products causing harm to customers are rare, but mobile phones are known to cause harm. Yet, they are not included in the CRO list,” added Gurjar.
The association has imposed a serious accusation on MAIT for supporting MNC brands over local and smaller Indian brands. Gurjar said, “MAIT is only representing the interests of the large MNC brands at the cost of local manufacturers and traders. MAIT is also working on behalf of MNC PC vendors to include even desktops in the CRO. If this happens, it will kill the local PC assemblers. We were not even consulted by MAIT on the matter.”
Besides desktops, TAIT also requested the government to exclude AIOs, thin clients and notebooks from the CRO list.
On the basis of the dicsussion that the association had with Deora, they are confident that changes will be seen in the CRO very soon. “Deora heard us patiently and assured us to look into the matter and discuss it with ministry officials. We told him that we were not only speaking on behalf of TAIT, but all IT associations with whom we are closely coordinating on this matter and who are against the CRO,” Gurjar further said.
