The Consumer Affairs Ministry requires the sale of welding electrodes by kilogram.

The Consumer Affairs Ministry has started to tighten the screws on the construction industry, requiring welding electrodes to be supplied in kilos rather than pieces/numbers. It has also sent notifications to tile businesses, requesting that they provide tile sizes on the boxes.

On November 30, the Legal Metrology division of the Consumer Affairs Ministry issued an order requiring makers of this equipment to “declare the quantity of each unit in weight… to provide accurate and adequate information to consumers.“

“It has come to the notice of the ministry that welding electrodes are being sold in pieces or numbers as the unit of measurement while in other countries it is sold in kg,” the statement said. In the interest of customers, it instructed manufacturers/importers/packers to offer these welding electrodes in weight proportion to the diameter of the welding rod. The decree will take effect on January 1, 2024.

Welding electrodes are metal wires or rods that conduct electricity and create heat during welding. They contain a chemical layer that keeps them from burning.

These rods, used in all sorts of infrastructure construction, are critical for a structure to withstand pressure. “If welding is not done properly, the structure may crack,” Hardik Sanghvi, Director of Royal Arc Electrodes, a Bombay-based firm, told Moneycontrol.

Before the directive, he said that industry participants utilized numbers/pieces as a unit of measurement. “This led to malpractices among manufacturers who kept the numbers the same but reduced the diameters/weight of this electrode,” says Sanghvi.

Before issuing the directive, the ministry spoke with several stakeholders and reviewed worldwide best practices. Ashutosh Agarwal, Director of Legal Metrology, said.

“A weak electrode will result in poor welding, rendering infrastructure projects ineffective.” Consumers, who are often unaware of such minute subtleties, purchased whatever was on offer. “We have now mandated that all manufacturers describe units in kilograms, which will bring consistency to the industry while discouraging those who engage in malpractice,” he told Moneycontrol.

The Consumer Affairs Ministry has also issued a similar warning to tile manufacturers, requiring them to publish the dimensions and quantity of tiles on the boxes of produced items. The ministry has also ordered that all makers and merchants include the month and year of production on all finished goods. The instructions will go into effect on January 1, 2024.