A survey by the Bureau of Indian Standards has found that only 14 of the 120 gold samples collected from various parts of the country conformed to the standards, meaning that most consumers are almost certain to buy substandard gold than the metal of desired purity.
The samples were collected by BIS from eight cities -- Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Jaipur, Bangalore, Ahmedabad and Kolkata -- to check the purity of gold, K C Trivedi, head of BIS Bhopal, told reporters in Indore on Thursday.
Not a single sample collected from Jaipur, Hyderabad and Kolkata was found to be in conformity with the BIS standards, he said.
Annually 500 tonnes of gold were purchased by the Indians every year and according to an estimate, due to ignorance about the gold quality, the consumers suffered a loss of nearly Rs 9,500 crore (Rs 95 billion) per annum, he said.
At present, only 14 BIS certified laboratories were operational in the country, he said and stressed the need to establish more such laboratories to test the purity of gold.
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