CENTRE WARNS EDTECH FIRMS AGAINST UNFAIR TRADE PRACTICES

Snehashish Roy

NEW DELHI: The government On Friday warned edtech companies against unfair practices, saying if self-regulation did not work, then stringent guidelines would need to be formulated.

The department of consumer affairs and self-regulatory body India Edtech Consortium (IEC) held a meeting, where issues related to unfair trade practices and misleading advertisement in the edtech sector were discussed.

“If self-regulation does not curb the unfair trade practices, then stringent guidelines would require to be formulated for ensuring transparency,” Rohit Kumar Singh, secretary, department of consumer affairs, said during the meeting.

Singh pointed out that certain advertisements and practices fail to “conform to prevalent guidelines and existing regulations”.

IEC comprises 95% of the Indian learner community and its member companies, upgrad, Byju’s, Vedantu, Unacademy, Whitehat Jr, Great Learning and Sunstone attended the meeting. They discussed the importance of enhancing the Indian edtech ecosystem “to better safeguard consumer interests, through seamless, transparent and feasible offerings for consumers”.

The meeting further discussed the rising number of fake reviews and referred to a recent report by Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI) that mentioned the education category as the largest violator of advertising code in 2021-22.

Singh suggested maintaining robust checkpoints aligning with consumers’ interests and advised IEC to form a joint working group to create standard operating procedures (SOPS).

The ASCI report, released on June 28, found that 33% of “objectionable or misleading” advertisements between April 2021 and March 2022 were from the education sector, including edtech enterprises. The self-regulatory organisation noted the edtech companies are available on several platforms and cater to local and regional audiences. “Promising things like job guarantees and certain marks or tests are not okay,” said Manisha Kapoor, CEO, ASCI, at a press conference.