BIS certification: ISI mark, CRS and QCOs

Who BIS is and what the mark certifies

The Bureau of Indian Standards is the national standards body, constituted under the Bureau of Indian Standards Act, 2016, which came into force on 12 October 2017. It is the successor to the Indian Standards Institution, which is what the ISI in the ISI mark stands for: BIS came into existence on 1 April 1987 and took over that institution’s staff, assets, liabilities and functions. It writes Indian Standards, and it certifies products against them. The certification schemes themselves sit in the Bureau of Indian Standards (Conformity Assessment) Regulations, 2018.

What the mark certifies is conformity to a named Indian Standard, nothing wider. It is not a quality ranking and not an endorsement of the maker, which is why a certificate is always read together with the IS number printed beside the mark.

How a standard becomes compulsory

Most Indian Standards are voluntary. A standard becomes compulsory for a product when the Central Government issues a Quality Control Order for it. BIS describes the trigger as public interest, the protection of human, animal or plant health, the safety of the environment, the prevention of unfair trade practices and national security; the QCO then directs the mandatory use of the Standard Mark under a licence or a certificate of conformity.

Two things follow that catch manufacturers out. The QCO, not BIS, is the instrument that creates the obligation, so the date to watch is the QCO’s commencement date and the ministry that issued it. And because a QCO is an executive order, it can be amended, deferred or withdrawn, which is what happened to the omnibus order on machinery safety.

Deferral is the common case, and it is done by substituting the commencement sub-paragraph rather than by issuing a circular, so the date only moves in the Gazette. The three woven-sack orders of 2023 have had that sub-paragraph replaced seven times: the 6 October 2026 date was moved again on the day it fell, to 6 November 2026 for the IS 16709 valve sacks and 6 January 2027 for the IS 11652 cement sacks and the IS 17399 mail sacks. The electrical appliances Quality Control Order went further and was superseded outright: a 2026 order replaced the 2025 one of the same name and reset the date to 1 October 2026. Reading the latest notification rather than the first is the whole discipline here.

There is a fourth move, and it does not happen in the Gazette at all. The ministry that administers a sector can exempt goods from compliance by an administrative order on its own website, usually for a fixed window and usually after the trade has asked. The Ministry of Steel exempted imported stainless steel flats from QCO compliance that way, against four Indian Standards and against a shipped on board date rather than a commencement date. An exemption of that kind carries no S.O. number, so a search for the Quality Control Order will not surface it.

The schemes, and which one applies

For products under compulsory certification BIS lists four routes.

Scheme I is the ISI mark. The manufacturer applies for a licence for a named product made at a named factory. BIS assesses the factory and its in-house testing, draws samples, and grants a licence to apply the ISI mark with the IS number and the licence number. Surveillance continues for the life of the licence. Cement, steel, electrical accessories, helmets and pressure cookers are familiar examples.

Scheme II is the Registration Scheme, almost always called the Compulsory Registration Scheme or CRS. The product is tested in a BIS-recognised laboratory and the manufacturer registers online with a self-declaration of conformity; there is no factory assessment, which makes it quicker. The mark is the Standard Mark with a registration number rather than the ISI mark. CRS covers electronics and information technology goods notified by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, solar photovoltaic products notified by the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy, and a few chemical and textile products.

Since 25 June 2026 Scheme II also reaches goods under ten orders that themselves require Scheme I, by way of the Scheme II route DPIIT opened for ten Quality Control Orders. That route runs through a permission DPIIT grants only to a company incorporated under the Companies Act, 2013, so it is not a general alternative to the ISI mark.

Scheme IV grants a certificate of conformity for goods not made on a continuous basis, and Scheme X is the route written into the recent machinery and electrical equipment orders. Foreign manufacturers apply under FMCS, and an importer selling a covered product in India needs the mark whoever made it.

What a supplier should check

If you make a covered product, check the IS number your product must meet, the scheme your QCO names, the testing you will need and where it can be done, and the commencement date. That last one is often three dates rather than one: the electrical appliances order above gives most firms 1 October 2026, a small enterprise 1 January 2027 and a micro enterprise 1 April 2027, in columns (5) to (7) of its table. The hand tools QCO staggers the same way, at 1 April 2027, 1 July 2027 and 1 October 2027 for the nine wrench, spanner and pliers standards it covers. So which MSME category a firm falls in decides the date it has to meet. What proves the category is a current Udyam certificate, so a firm still holding only a Udyog Aadhaar memorandum has nothing to put on the claim until it re-registers. If you supply a covered product as a component, check whether the QCO reaches components, because several do.

If you are buying, the number on the mark is checkable: BIS publishes its licensees and registered manufacturers, and a mark that cannot be traced to a live licence is a mark worth refusing. Solar module buyers meet this most often, since modules under the PLI scheme are separately subject to CRS registration and the two lists are not the same list.