Consumer Affairs mandates FMCG brands fix redressal systems
- 1Consumer Affairs Secretary Nidhi Khare has directed FMCG, food, and retail industries to strengthen grievance redressal mechanisms as complaints have increased five-fold over the past five years.
- 2The government is expanding testing infrastructure through the National Test House for emerging sectors including EV batteries, organic food, and drones while simplifying BIS standards for industry compliance.
- 3The department is leveraging technology through the National Consumer Helpline and e-Jagriti portal to protect consumer rights and process complaints more efficiently.
- 4Khare emphasized that quality concerns in manufacturing and selling must be addressed, citing examples of poor redressal even from premium automobile brands.
- 5The government is pushing for increased use of AI and robotics to boost product testing capacity across quality standards.
Complaints surge 5x in five years as government pushes quality standards and testing infrastructure overhaul
India's FMCG, retail, and food industries are facing regulatory pressure to overhaul their consumer grievance redressal systems as the government signals a zero-tolerance approach to quality lapses. Speaking at a FICCI conference in early August 2026, Consumer Affairs Secretary Nidhi Khare delivered an unambiguous message: brands can no longer afford to ignore the quality-consciousness of Indian consumers, with complaint volumes surging to five times the levels recorded in 2021.
The Scale of the Consumer Discontent Problem
The five-fold increase in consumer complaints over five years represents a critical inflection point for Indian brands. This isn't merely about increased awareness or digital access—it reflects a fundamental shift in consumer expectations and their willingness to escalate issues when brands fail to deliver. Khare's pointed reference to poor grievance handling even by "top-notch" automobile companies underscores that the problem cuts across price segments and categories. For marketers, this surge in complaints should be read as a leading indicator of brand vulnerability. Every unresolved grievance represents not just one dissatisfied customer but a potential reputational crisis amplified through social media and consumer forums. The government's decision to publicly highlight these failings at an industry forum signals that regulatory patience is wearing thin.
Infrastructure and Standards Push: What's Changing
The government is taking concrete steps to create the infrastructure ecosystem for quality enforcement. The National Test House is expanding capabilities into high-growth sectors including aerospace, drones, organic food testing, EV batteries, switches, and solar panels. This expansion is particularly relevant for brands operating in or planning to enter these emerging categories. Simultaneously, the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) is working to simplify standards to improve industry compliance rates. For brand managers, this means two things: first, testing and certification processes should become more accessible and less bureaucratic; second, non-compliance will become increasingly difficult to justify. The government's emphasis on deploying AI and robotics for sample testing suggests a future where quality checks become more frequent, comprehensive, and harder to circumvent through traditional means.
Technology as the New Enforcement Lever
The Consumer Affairs Department's digital infrastructure—the National Consumer Helpline and the e-Jagriti portal—has created unprecedented transparency in complaint tracking and resolution. These platforms are not merely administrative tools; they represent a fundamental power shift toward consumers. Brands can no longer quietly manage dissatisfied customers behind closed doors. Every unresolved complaint on these platforms creates a documented trail that regulators can access and act upon. For marketing and customer service leaders, this necessitates a complete rethinking of grievance handling protocols. Response times, resolution quality, and escalation mechanisms must be designed with the assumption of regulatory oversight. The old approach of treating customer service as a cost center separate from brand strategy is no longer tenable.
Cross-Sector Implications and the Quality Imperative
Khare's assertion that "we cannot grow unless we actually look after the quality concerns" reflects the government's broader economic strategy of positioning India as a quality-conscious manufacturing and consumption economy. This aligns with Make in India objectives and the push for premium positioning in global markets. For brands across FMCG, retail, and food sectors, quality is being reframed from a compliance requirement to a growth enabler. The message is clear: cut corners on quality and face both regulatory action and consumer backlash; invest in quality and gain government support for growth ambitions. This is particularly significant for brands eyeing export markets or premium segment expansion domestically.
This regulatory intervention represents a watershed moment for brand-consumer relationships in India. The government is essentially forcing brands to internalize a cost they've long externalized—the cost of poor quality and inadequate grievance handling. For decades, Indian consumers accepted substandard service as the norm, but rising aspirations, digital access, and now regulatory backing have created a perfect storm that will separate resilient brands from vulnerable ones. Forward-thinking marketing leaders should view this not as a compliance burden but as a competitive opportunity to differentiate through superior quality and service standards.
The broader implication is that marketing organizations must now integrate quality assurance and customer service deeply into their core strategy, not treat them as operational afterthoughts. The CMO-COO divide that characterizes many Indian organizations is no longer sustainable. Brands that build seamless connections between marketing promises, product quality, and service delivery will capture the trust—and wallet share—of India's increasingly demanding consumers. Those that don't will find themselves in regulatory crosshairs and social media storms with equal frequency.
The era of marketing promises disconnected from product and service reality is ending. With complaints up 5x, testing infrastructure expanding, and digital platforms creating transparency, marketers must champion quality and grievance redressal as core brand pillars. This requires organizational integration between marketing, operations, quality assurance, and customer service functions. The brands that thrive in the next phase of Indian consumption will be those that build trust through consistent quality and responsive service—not those that rely on advertising volume to paper over operational failures.
This article is an editorial rewrite based on reporting originally published by The Hindu Business Line. The original article has been rewritten and contextualised for India's marketing community by The Wise Marketing Desk using AI-assisted editorial tools.
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