Notes from the floor .

MSME payment disallowance: the buyer’s problem

The rule, and the number it carries now Section 37 of the Income-tax Act, 2025 is headed certain deductions allowed on actual payment basis only. Sub-section (2), clause (g), covers an amount payable by the assessee to a micro or small enterprise beyond the time limit specified in section 15 of the MSMED Act, 2006. […]

October 2026 · 5 min read

MSME delayed payments: how a small brand gets paid

Forty-five days is a ceiling, not a default Section 15 of the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Development Act, 2006 says the buyer must pay on or before the date agreed in writing with the supplier, and that in no case may that agreed period exceed 45 days from the day of acceptance or deemed […]

October 2026 · 5 min read

Ethylene oxide in spice exports: one test, two verdicts

What ethylene oxide is doing in a spice lot The Spices Board’s own Comprehensive Guidelines on Prevention of Ethylene Oxide Contamination in Spices Exports, document SB/EXP/SOP/02 Rev.01 issued on 6 May 2024, describes it as a gas serving as a disinfectant, fumigant, sterilising agent and insecticide. On spices the point of it is microbial load. […]

October 2026 · 8 min read

Selling spices online in India: ground is not whole

A packaged spice brand in India is rarely a manufacturer in the ordinary sense. It buys cleaned whole spice, grinds or blends it, packs it and sells it. Each step lands the product in a different part of the Food Safety and Standards (Food Products Standards and Food Additives) Regulations, 2011, and the part that […]

October 2026 · 7 min read

2D barcode declarations: what a scan cannot replace

The answer first: the Rules do not let declarations move Rule 6(4A) of the Legal Metrology (Packaged Commodities) Rules, 2011 is the provision that mentions codes at all. It permits a manufacturer, packer or importer to put a barcode, a GTIN or a QR code on the package in addition to the mandatory declarations. That […]

October 2026 · 6 min read

GS1 Sunrise 2027: the deadline that is not a law

What Sunrise 2027 actually commits whom to Sunrise 2027 is a GS1 initiative, and GS1 is a standards body, not a regulator. The commitment sits on retailers, not on you. GS1 US describes it as a global transition from 1D UPC barcodes to 2D barcodes that supports retailers in ensuring their point-of-sale systems can read […]

October 2026 · 5 min read

APOB in GST: it cannot cross a state line

The answer first: an APOB cannot cross a state line Section 25(2) of the CGST Act says a person seeking registration shall be granted a single registration in a State or Union territory. Its proviso lets a person with multiple places of business in a State or Union territory get a separate registration for each. […]

October 2026 · 6 min read

Multi-state GST registration: where your stock decides

The rule is state-wise, and your stock picks the state Section 22(1) of the CGST Act, 2017 makes a supplier liable to register in the State or Union territory from where he makes a taxable supply. Not where the company is incorporated, not where the founders sit, not where the buyer lives. Then section 2(85) […]

October 2026 · 6 min read

Brand Creative

Copyright in product photos: who actually owns them

Section 17 does not say what most founders think Section 17 of the Copyright Act, 1957 opens with the rule everyone half-remembers: the author of a work shall be the first owner of the copyright therein. Section 2(d)(iv) makes the author of a photograph the person taking it, and section 2(c)(i) makes a photograph an […]

October 2026 · 6 min read

Design registration India: post it and lose it

What a registered design protects, and what it cannot Section 2(d) of the Designs Act, 2000 defines a design as only the features of shape, configuration, pattern, ornament or composition of lines or colours applied to an article, in two dimensions or three or both, by any industrial process, which in the finished article appeal […]

October 2026 · 6 min read

Honey adulteration testing: what you must prove

The authenticity rows the standard actually names Clause 2.8.3 of the Food Safety and Standards (Food Products Standards and Food Additives) Regulations, 2011 carries four authenticity parameters: C4 sugar, maximum 7.0 percent by mass, the cane and corn route. 2-Acetylfuran-3-Glucopyranoside, listed as Marker for Rice Syrup, required to be Absent, with a minimum required performance […]

October 2026 · 6 min read

Selling honey online in India: what the jar must say

The standard is one clause and seventeen rows Honey sits at clause 2.8.3 of the Food Safety and Standards (Food Products Standards and Food Additives) Regulations, 2011, inside chapter 2.8, Sweetening agents including Honey. The clause defines honey as the natural sweet substance honey bees produce from nectar, from plant secretions, or from excretions of […]

October 2026 · 6 min read

Unredeemed gift cards in India: whose money

Selling gift cards into the festive window takes cash today against goods you may ship in March, or never. Four bodies of Indian law speak to that balance, and three say less than founders expect. A gift card is not a loyalty point. Points are a deferred discount you fund yourself, which is why loyalty […]

October 2026 · 6 min read

D2C

Gift card GST in India: when the tax lands

If a brand sells a Rs 2,000 gift card on 8 October and the customer spends it on 20 November, the date the tax attaches to is what decides the return. Until late 2025 that question had three live answers in India, depending on which authority you read. It now has one. The answer, stated […]

October 2026 · 6 min read

Battery waste EPR India: the second registration

A separate instrument, and a separate portal The Battery Waste Management Rules, 2022 were notified by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change as S.O. 3984(E) dated 22 August 2022, published in the Gazette on 24 August 2022, under sections 3, 6, 8 and 25 of the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986, superseding the Batteries […]

October 2026 · 6 min read

E-waste EPR India: who counts as a producer

The instrument, and what it is not The governing instrument is the E-Waste (Management) Rules, 2022, notified by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change as G.S.R. 801(E) dated 2 November 2022 under sections 6, 8 and 25 of the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986. They superseded the 2016 rules and came into force on […]

October 2026 · 6 min read

Operations Logistics

Perfume shipping in India: UN1266 and the surface lane

What puts a bottle inside Class 3 The dangerous goods entry for fragrance is UN1266, proper shipping name Perfumery products with flammable solvents, hazard Class 3, flammable liquids. The word perfume does not trigger it. The flash point does. Class 3 covers liquids with a flash point at or below 60 degrees Celsius. Within the […]

October 2026 · 5 min read

Selling perfumes online in India: the spirit problem

Perfume is a cosmetic, and the Fourth Schedule names it twice A fragrance is a cosmetic under the Drugs and Cosmetics Act, 1940, and it is governed by the Cosmetics Rules, 2020. That much is settled, and it is also where most sellers stop reading. The useful detail sits in the Fourth Schedule to those […]

October 2026 · 5 min read

Handmade listings: what variation really costs

Variation is a data problem before it is a photography problem A catalogue rests on one assumption: every unit of a SKU is the same unit. Handmade work breaks that at the source, and the gap between the photograph and the parcel is where the return comes from. The fix is a tolerance band, written […]

September 2026 · 6 min read

Selling puja products online: the real asks

Classify the object, not the occasion A brass diya is a brass article. A packet of prasad is a food. A camphor tablet is a flammable solid. The occasion an item serves is not a legal category, and no regulator keeps a devotional shelf. Every obligation here arrives through the material, the process or the […]

September 2026 · 6 min read

Operations Logistics

Bicycle assembly in India: delivered is not rideable

Four ways to close the last fifteen per cent There are four honest options. Each puts cost, damage and liability somewhere different. Ship fully boxed. Cheapest to pack and move, and the factory carton is the most protective it will ever have. The whole build goes to the buyer. Ship mostly assembled, usually written as […]

September 2026 · 6 min read

Selling bicycles online in India: a box, not a bike

No notified order covers a whole bicycle. Two cover its parts. Start with what is actually compulsory, because certification vendors will tell you something else. No notified quality control order makes a complete bicycle carry the Standard Mark in India. What exists is a draft. In June 2026 the Department for Promotion of Industry and […]

September 2026 · 5 min read

Shared services: what two brands can share

Share the cost base, not the brand Once there are two or three brands, every operating question reduces to one: what does this brand share, and what does it own. Share too much and you get two brands that sound like each other, which defeats the reason you started a second one. Share too little […]

September 2026 · 7 min read

House of brands: when a second brand is honest

A second line is range work. A second brand is a new company The brand works, the founder has capacity, and somebody says the next move is a second brand. Usually it is not. Usually it is a second line, which is a different and much cheaper decision. Range architecture already handles most of what […]

September 2026 · 7 min read

Earnouts and Escrow: Why the Headline Is Not the Price

The headline is a ceiling, not a price An announced consideration is usually four things. Cash at close. An adjustment measured after close for cash, debt and working capital against an agreed target. An amount in escrow against warranty claims. And an earnout, contingent on the business doing something it has not done yet. Only […]

September 2026 · 7 min read

Strategic vs Financial Buyer: Two Different Prices

They are solving two different problems A strategic buyer is an operating company. Somewhere in its plan is a line saying it needs a position in your category by a certain year. Buying you is one route to that line, building it is the other, and both sit in the same paper that goes to […]

September 2026 · 6 min read

Water resistance is a pressure test, not a depth

Water resistance is the most misread number in consumer goods. It is printed in metres, so buyers read it as a depth. It is produced by a static pressure test on a new watch standing still. Every water-damage argument starts in that gap. Operational guidance, not legal advice. What the Indian Standard actually tests The […]

September 2026 · 6 min read

Selling watches online in India: two products

A Rs 500 fashion watch and a Rs 5 lakh mechanical watch share a catalogue tile and almost nothing else. The case metal moves the tariff line, the movement decides which Indian Standard applies, and new versus pre-owned decides whether you needed an import authorisation. Operational guidance, not legal advice. Rs 500 and Rs 5 […]

September 2026 · 6 min read

BEE star labels: what the rating commits you to

The label is permission, granted per model The Bureau of Energy Efficiency (Appliance Labelling and Compliance) Regulations, 2026 were notified as No. 5506 on 26 December 2025, published in the Gazette of India Extraordinary on 29 December 2025, and came into force on 1 January 2026. They are made under section 58 of the Energy […]

September 2026 · 6 min read

Kitchen appliances online: three orders, one kitchen

Powered is a different lane from cookware A buyer sees one shelf. A regulator sees a mains connection. The moment an appliance has a plug it leaves the world of pans and enters product safety certification, and nothing you learned from non electric cookware or writing coating claims carries over. A pressure cooker and the […]

September 2026 · 6 min read

Pricing Lab-Grown Diamonds: The Floor Keeps Moving

The wholesale price of the stone keeps falling. The retail price does not fall anywhere near as fast. That gap is the commercial case for a laboratory-grown brand, and the thing most likely to break one. What the input price has actually done Use named indices with dates, because these figures do not survive a […]

September 2026 · 5 min read

Selling Lab-Grown Diamonds: What You Must Say

A laboratory-grown diamond is a diamond. Same carbon, same lattice, same hardness, and on most retail equipment the same reading. That is the reason the disclosure rules are strict rather than the reason they should be relaxed. The word diamond is now a reserved word BIS has notified IS 19469:2025, a modified adoption of ISO […]

September 2026 · 5 min read

Thread Count and GSM: Claims India Can Test

Thread count is counted per centimetre, and only once A number on a listing becomes a claim the moment somebody can test it. Thread count can be tested, which is the problem, because the test and the marketing figure measure different things. IS 1963, second revision of 1981, gives two procedures for threads per unit […]

September 2026 · 6 min read

Selling Home Textiles Online: Size Is the Claim

A bed size is a dimension, not a body Apparel fit is a body problem, covered in apparel sizing and fit returns. Home textiles share the symptom, not the cause. A bedsheet has no wearer. It has a mattress, and a mattress is a number. It should be arithmetic. It is not, because nobody fixed […]

September 2026 · 6 min read

School season stationery stock: one spike, no reorder

One spike, and no second attempt Most inventory planning assumes you can correct. A reorder point exists because demand and lead time both wobble, so you top up. That machinery is worth having and it does almost nothing for a school season. Selling through in eight weeks while replenishment takes six is not replenishment. It […]

September 2026 · 5 min read

Selling stationery online in India: pencil nil, pen 18%

The unit you sell is not the unit you make A ball pen costs a few rupees to land. The polybag, the barcode, the pick, the pack and the lightest shipping band do not scale down to meet it. So the first decision in a stationery catalogue is not which pens to list. It is […]

September 2026 · 5 min read

Licensed Merchandise in India: Reading the Deal

You are not buying a brand. You are renting a defined permission to put someone else’s intellectual property on goods you make and carry the inventory risk on. Everything hard about the deal follows from that. Not a franchise, and not a content licence A franchise licenses a business system. You operate the licensor’s format […]

September 2026 · 6 min read

Celebrity Equity or Ambassador Fee: How to Choose

Two deals get discussed in the same meeting. One is a media purchase. The other is a permanent change to your cap table. They are not versions of each other. Where the cost lands, and when An ambassador fee is an expense in a period. You agree a number, a term, a shoot count and […]

September 2026 · 6 min read

Variable Weight Online: What 500g Commits You To

You list a 500 g cut. You ship 470 g. The customer puts it on a kitchen scale and photographs the reading. That is the variable weight problem, and it runs through pricing, listing copy, refunds, ratings and the Legal Metrology Act. First a disambiguation, because two problems share a word. Courier weight discrepancy disputes […]

September 2026 · 5 min read

Selling Seafood and Meat Online in India: The Hard Parts

Fresh and frozen animal protein is the hardest food category to put online in India. Not because demand is thin. Because the product was alive somewhere upstream, the standards are written species by species, and most of the evidence a platform asks for is generated inside a plant you probably do not own. The three […]

September 2026 · 5 min read

Toy age grading: the number that picks your tests

The age band is a test selection, not a claim IS 9873 (Part 1) is identical with ISO 8124-1, and it does not treat a toy as one object with one set of rules. Requirements vary by the age group the toy is intended for, birth to 14 years, because the hazard and the child’s […]

September 2026 · 5 min read

Selling toys online in India: the licence trap

One order, and it moved before it ever started The instrument is the Toys (Quality Control) Order, 2020, notified by the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade as S.O. 853(E) on 25 February 2020 under sections 16, 17 and 25(3) of the Bureau of Indian Standards Act, 2016. It was written to start […]

September 2026 · 5 min read

Operations Logistics

Shipping a Live Plant: Hours in the Dark

Every hard category in Indian eCommerce is hard for one clean reason. Furniture, freight. Frozen, temperature. A live plant is hard because it starts running out of time the moment you tape the carton. That reorganises the operation. The machinery you run for damage rates and returns disposition was built for objects that are the […]

September 2026 · 6 min read

Plants and Seeds Online: Which Licence Applies

A garden brand sells four legally distinct things from one warehouse: seed, fertiliser, a pesticide, and a living plant. Each sits under its own instrument. Seeds: the licence is real, and the definition decides who needs it The Seeds (Control) Order, 1983 was made under section 3 of the Essential Commodities Act, 1955 and notified […]

September 2026 · 6 min read

Cookware claims: non-stick, tri-ply, 304 steel

The ISI mark says nothing about your grade of steel The general evidence machinery sits in our claim substantiation file and our note on front of pack claims. What follows is the category layer. 304 and 202 are AISI series designations, not Indian Standard names, and a buyer reading 304 is being sold a chromium […]

September 2026 · 5 min read

Cookware compliance: the pan, the steel, the gasket

The pressure cooker order is the settled one Domestic pressure cookers were pulled into compulsory certification before most kitchen brands opened a marketplace account. The Bureau of Indian Standards lists the instrument as the Domestic Pressure Cooker (Quality Control) Order, 2020, notified as S.O. 294(E) on 21 January 2020 and amended by S.O. 2019(E) on […]

September 2026 · 5 min read

Razor and Blades: Who Owns the Refill

Bombay Shaving Company lists its Sensi Smart 3 razor at Rs 99 against an MRP of Rs 149, and two Sensi Smart 3 cartridges at Rs 299. One replacement blade costs more than the entire razor. That is not a pricing error. It is the business model, printed on the brand’s own site. Refill packs […]

September 2026 · 5 min read

Grooming Products Online: Cosmetic or Drug

A beard oil that conditions, a beard serum that claims to grow hair, and a herbal beard oil sold as an Ayurvedic preparation are three products under three licensing regimes. Nothing on the shelf tells them apart. The claim on the pack does. The AYUSH track is set out in selling Ayurvedic products online and […]

September 2026 · 5 min read

The luggage warranty gap when the airline breaks it

Luggage is sold on long warranties and destroyed by people who did not sell it. A suitcase spends its working life being thrown onto belts, dragged across aprons and crushed under other bags. When it comes back broken, the damage is usually not a manufacturing defect, the customer did not cause it, and the party […]

September 2026 · 5 min read

Selling luggage online in India: the numbers that bite

Luggage looks like an easy category to list. It is a box with wheels, the photography is simple, and the size chart seems to write itself. Then the returns arrive, and most of them trace back to one number on the listing that turned out to be wrong at an airport gate. Cabin size is […]

September 2026 · 5 min read

Auto Parts Fitment Data: What the RC Omits

A shoe that does not fit comes back folded and gets resold. A wheel hub that does not fit comes back scratched, after a mechanic has had it in his hands and charged for the hour. Same return reason on the dashboard, different economics, different root cause. Fitment belongs to this category and no other. […]

September 2026 · 6 min read

Selling Auto Parts Online: Who Each Rule Binds

An importer lands two pallets. One holds brake pads, the other holds tyres. Only one of them needs a licence from the Bureau of Indian Standards before it can legally sit in a fulfilment centre. Nothing about the products tells you which. Two wheeler helmets are the exception most sellers have heard of, and they […]

September 2026 · 6 min read

Footwear Sizes in India: Four Numbers, One Box

One pair of shoes can carry four numbers: a UK number on the insole, a US number on the box, an EU number on the barcode label and a centimetre figure in the supplier sheet. Only one of them traces back to an Indian Standard, and that standard was written for the factory, not for […]

September 2026 · 5 min read

Selling Footwear Online: Two Orders, One Shoe

A helmet has one Quality Control Order and one standard. Footwear has two orders split by material, a third for occupational safety footwear, and twenty-four table entries between the first two. Before any certification mechanics matter, you have to find the row your shoe is on. Cookware goes further again, with the obligation layered across […]

September 2026 · 5 min read

What a UV400 Claim on Sunglasses Has to Prove

Three claims sell sunglasses in India: UV protection, polarisation, and a category number that implies darkness equals safety. All three are measurable, which is the problem, because a measurable claim is one a regulator, a marketplace or a competitor can check. The general discipline of holding evidence before you publish is covered in the claim […]

September 2026 · 6 min read

Selling Eyewear Online in India: The Real Split

Eyewear looks like one category on a marketplace and behaves like three in an operating plan. Treat a pair of sunglasses, a powered spectacle lens and a coloured contact lens as variants of one catalogue line and you eventually find that only one of them is a licensed product in India, and it is rarely […]

September 2026 · 6 min read

Sports equipment listings: the numbers are the claim

Look at what actually does the selling on a sporting goods page. Not a story, not an ingredient list. A bench is sold by the weight it takes, a band by its resistance in kilograms, a rope by its breaking load, a bat by its grade. Strip the numbers out and there is almost no […]

September 2026 · 5 min read

Helmet certification: one order, one standard

Protective gear is an unusual thing to sell online. The buyer cannot test what matters, and for one article in the range the state has already decided what good enough means. Most sellers get as far as knowing that helmets need an ISI mark. The order behind it, the scheme it runs under, and who […]

September 2026 · 5 min read

Ayurvedic Ads and the 54 Diseases You Cannot Claim

Most Indian consumer brands learn the advertising rules through the consumer-protection lane: substantiate the claim, do not disparage, keep the front of pack honest. An Ayurvedic brand carries all of that plus a criminal statute from 1954. The Drugs and Magic Remedies (Objectionable Advertisements) Act, 1954, Act 21 of 1954, came into force on 1 […]

September 2026 · 6 min read