FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS ON HALLMARKING OF GOLD & SILVER

Q. 1 What is Hallmarking?
A. Hallmarking is the accurate determination and official recording of the
proportionate content of precious metal in precious metal (gold or silver) articles.
Hallmarks are thus official marks used in many countries as a guarantee of purity or fineness of precious metal (gold or silver) articles.

Q. 2 What are the objectives behind instituting Hallmarking Scheme?
A. To protect consumer against victimization due to irregular gold or silver quality, develop India as a leading gold market centre in the World and to develop export
competitiveness

Q. 3 What are the benefits to Customer?
A Provide third party assurance and satisfaction that customer gets right purity of
gold (or silver) for the given price (value for money).

Q. 4 How will the jewelers benefit?
A. It will provide clear indication of his capability, strong evidence of commitment to quality and assurance of consistency in purity and quality of gold (or silver) jewelery.

Q. 5 Who operates the Hallmarking Scheme?
A. It is a voluntary scheme being operated by BIS under the BIS Act 1986. BIS is
operating the scheme through its network of Regional/ Branch Offices all over the country.
As per this scheme the license is granted to a jeweler for certification of purity of gold (or silver) jewelery in accordance with IS 1417 (IS 2112 for Silver). A licensee jeweler has to get the jewelery hallmarked through any of the BIS recognized Assaying and hallmarking centres (see list of assaying centres at www.bis.org.in under Hallmarking of gold & silver).

Q. 6 What is the procedure for Grant of License to Jewelers?
A. To get BIS certification, jeweler needs to apply to the concerned Branch office of BIS in the prescribed application form along with necessary documents and fees for obtaining a license. Application Form with details of documents to be submitted and fees applicable are available on BIS website. After grant of license, jeweler is to get the Jewelery hallmarked from a BIS recognized Assaying & Hallmarking Centre. It is the prime responsibility of the license holder to ensure declared fineness and homogeneity of jewelery offered for hallmarking. List of BIS licensed Jewelers is also available on BIS website. Link for locating hallmarked jeweler in your city has also been provided on BIS website.

Q. 7 What is the procedure for Grant of Recognition to Hallmarking Centres?
A. The recognition of the Hallmarking Centre is done by BIS after ensuring that the Hallmarking Centre has requisite infrastructure and quality management system as per BIS Criteria for Recognition of Assaying & hallmarking Centres, IS 1417 for Gold and IS 2112 for Silver and assaying test facilities as per IS 1418 for Gold and IS 2113 for Silver, trained and competent manpower. The procedure for recognition and de-recognition and Criteria for Recognition of Centres is available on BIS website. The list of BIS recognized assaying and hallmarking centres is also hosted on BIS website.

Q. 8 What control BIS has on Licensee Jewelers and Assaying and Hallmarking Centres?
A. Regular surveillance audit of Assaying and hallmarking centres and testing of
random market samples drawn from licensee jewelers is carried out. Renewal of
recognition of hallmarking centres and jewelers is based on performance every three years. If any jeweler or assaying and hallmarking centre is not found conforming to the requirements, action is taken as per laid down procedure so that credibility of scheme is maintained.

Q. 9 What one should look for in an Hallmarked gold article ?
A. Gold Hallmark consists of following
i) BIS Mark
ii) Purity grade/fineness (it can be any one of the following )
958 Corresponds to 23 Carat
916 Corresponds to 22 Carat
875 Corresponds to 21 Carat
750 Corresponds to 18 Carat
708 Corresponds to 17 Carat
585 Corresponds to 14 Carat
375 Corresponds to 9 Carat
iii) Assaying/Hallmarking Centre’s Identification Mark (one of the logos as
displayed on BIS website)
iv) Year of Marking – denoted by a code letter e.g.
‘A’ for year 2000
‘B’ for year 2001
‘C’ for year 2002
‘D’ for year 2003
‘E’ for year 2004
‘F’ for year 2005
‘G’ for year 2006
‘H’ for year 2007
‘J’ for year 2008
v) Jeweler’s Identification Mark

Q. 10 Does BIS Scheme Cover hallmarking of Gold Medallions?
A. Gold medallions (of the shape of coins) of 995 fineness and below are being
permitted to be hallmarked.

Q. 11 What is the progress of the gold hallmarking scheme during the last 7 years?
A. Gold Hallmarking Scheme was launched in April 2000. Following is the progress of the scheme since launch:

Growth 31 Mar. 2001 31 Mar.2002 31 Mar.2003 31 Mar.2004 31 Mar.2005 31 Mar.2006 31 Mar.2007 31 Mar.2008

license
Licenses 186 286 560 795 935 1410 3466 5388
No. of
Centres 8 12 13 15 24 36 45 91
Articles
Hallmarked
(in lakhs) 0.936 4.766 14.93 31.4 62.4 115 210.3 381.99
Information on current no. of licenses and no. of Centres is available on the BIS website.

Q. 12 How much does it cost to get an gold article hallmarked?
A. BIS recognized Assaying and hallmarking Centres have been advised to follow the following hallmarking charges for Gold: Rs. 18/- per article Minimum charges for a consignment shall be Rs. 100/- . (Services Tax and other levies as applicable shall be extra).

Q. 13 What is the progress of the silver hallmarking scheme ?
A. BIS has launched hallmarking of Silver Jewelery/Artefacts in October 2005. 405 no. licenses have been granted for silver till 31 March 2008.

Q. 14 How much does it cost to get an gold article hallmarked?
A. BIS recognized Assaying and hallmarking Centres have been advised to follow the following hallmarking charges for Silver:
Rs. 10.00 per article upto 100 g
Rs 50.00 per article from 100 -500g
Rs 100.00 per article more than 500g
Minimum charges per consignment is Rs 150.00
(Services Tax and other levies as applicable shall be extra).

Q. 15 What one should look for in an Hallmarked silver article?
A. Silver Hallmark consists of following
i) BIS Mark LOGO Silver
ii) Purity grade/fineness (it can be any one of the following )
999.9
999.5 Fine Silver
999

970
925 Silver alloys
835 For jewellery,
900 artefacts
800

iii) Assaying/Hallmarking Centre’s Identification Mark (one of the logos as displayed on BIS website)
iv) Year of Marking – denoted by a code letter e.g.‘‘J’ for year 2008
v) Jeweler’s Identification Mark


Q. 16 What is the Role of Government of India?
A. Govt. of India took cognizance of the need for protecting the public in its purchase of gold jewellery and the prevention of adulteration, be it deliberate or accidental. BIS was identified as the sole body to operate Hallmarking Scheme in India. BIS started Hallmarking Scheme for gold jewellery in April 2000.

• Government of India constituted a Committee in August 2003 to examine the ways and means of securing consumer interest in the marketing of gold products with Secretary (Consumer Affairs) as Chairman. The Committee comprises of
representatives from BIS, Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Commerce, RBI, India
Govt. Mint, Gem and Jewellery Export Promotion Council, All India Sarafa
Association, New Delhi, World Gold Council (WGC), MMTC, representative of a
reputed Jeweller and Consumer Activists.

• The broad terms of reference of the committee are:
i) To examine current practices in the purchase and sale of gold products
and the desirability of standardization through Hallmarking; and
ii) Whether such hallmarking can be made mandatory?

• The Committee has met several times in the past and based on the
recommendations of the committee various initiatives have been taken as follows:
> Scheme for creating infrastructure for Assaying and Hallmarking of Gold with
Central Assistance is being implemented by BIS for providing financial incentive for setting up of 50 Assaying and Hallmarking Centres during 11th five year plan.
Selected entrepreneurs to be given one time financial incentive of 15% of the cost of machinery and equipment subject to maximum of Rs.15 lakhs per Centre. In States of North-East & Special category states, selected entrepreneurs to be given one time financial incentive of 30% of the cost of machinery and equipment subject to maximum of Rs.30 lakhs per Centre. 19 Assaying and Hallmarking Centres have been set up under the scheme as on 30 Sept. 2008.

> Effective Publicity Campaign has also been launched simultaneously through print and electronic media for consumer awareness.

> Govt. of India has decided to make bring Gold Hallmarking under mandatory
certification in phases starting with first phase in four metros.

> RBI Circular to Banks for Preferential treatment to Hallmarked Jewelery while
granting Advances against Jewelery – November 2005 (hosted on BIS website)

Gold Is The Only Asset To Stay Steady

Whether the green shoots of recovery have become reality or remain an optimistic illusion, there is no denying that gold is just about the only asset class that has stayed reasonably steady since January ‘08 as the recession gathered pace.

Despite credit tightening, profit taking, central bank sales, the much trumpeted threat of deflation, and anti gold spin from vested interests and analysts that should have known better, the precious yellow metal continues to be the safest play around.

Now the fear of eventual hyper inflation as a result of pushing excessive amounts of new money into global economies seems to have been widely recognised, gold, together with silver, are the remaining safe haven stores of value.

Add the fact that China is steadily increasing its gold reserves the expense of its huge holdings of US dollars that seem destined to continue to lose value, together with the forecast of a continuing drop in world gold output, begs this question.

Why has gold had such difficulty in breaking out and sustaining a rise into the mid $900 an ounce level?

In the face of all the evidence it does seem likely that a concerted effort by those central banks most to lose as their currencies plunge in value and led by the U.S. are desperately trying to hold back the gold price. After all gold remains the only realistic measure of a currency’s value.

On a number of occasions gold has risen in overnight trading in Asia and morning European trading only to fall back after New York opens and then firming up after hours.

Today gold hit $928 an ounce at the European open but by midday had fallen $5 to $923 an ounce. It will be interesting to see how the metal trades during today’s New York session, it could be that speculators are getting the message and cashing in on some nice regular shorts.

Despite this it is clear that there remains an underlying strength to the metal and the activity of the last two weeks may now have resulted in a slow but steady move up, albeit with a few dips along the way.

Surely it is only a question of time before the central banks and US government give up their futile attempts to manipulate the market and let gold and silver prices reflect their true value in times of economic uncertainty.

Sourced from : http://www.preciousmetalinvestment.com

A List of Senior Gold Mining Stocks

• Barrick Gold ………….No 1 by size and market cap
• Newmont
• Kinross Gold
• Freeport McMoran
  
• Anglo Gold Ashanti
• Goldcorp
• Newcrest Gold Fields
• Harmony
• Eldorado Gold
• IAMGOLD
• Lihir Gold
• Centerra Gold
• Highland Gold
• Hecla Mining
• Jaguar Mining
• Berna Gold
• Glamis Gold
• Agnico-Eagle Mines
• Celtic Resources
• Yamana Resources
• High River Gold Mines
• Western Areas
• Meridian Gold
• Peter Hambro Mining
• Cambior

  Some Emerging Gold Producers

• Ballard Goldfields
• Perserverence Corp
• Axmin
• Banro
• European Goldfields
• Oxus Gold
• Anatolia Minerals
• Alamos Gold
• International Minerals
• Trans-Siberaian Gold
• Bendigo Mining

Gold Investment Guide

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M/s. Vishnu Jagnnath Bhalerao
M/s. Bhalerao Jewellers
Yavatmal
India