Endorsement guidelines in India: what the Consumer Affairs rules require

The Department of Consumer Affairs (DoCA) regulates influencer endorsements in three layers: the Central Consumer Protection Authority's Guidelines for Prevention of Misleading Advertisements and Endorsements for Misleading Advertisements, 2022, which carry the fines; the Endorsement Know-hows! guide of 20 January 2023; and additional health and wellness guidelines of 10 August 2023. Between them they require clear disclosure of any material connection and due diligence before anyone endorses a product.

Our ASCI influencer guidelines guide covers the advertising industry's code and summarises these penalties in a paragraph. This post goes deeper into the government side: what each document says, what counts as due diligence, and how a brand builds it into a campaign. For the wider channel, see our complete guide to influencer marketing in India.

Three documents, one framework

Two notes on confidence. First, the Know-hows booklet itself sits on the Department's website, which we could not open, so we describe it from the PIB release of 20 January 2023. Second, PIB says the August 2023 health guidelines were issued "in lieu of" the Know-hows booklet and as an extension of the 2022 guidelines. Coverage differs on whether that replaces the booklet entirely. The health guidance covers health only, and the booklet's general principles are still the clearest statement of what the regulator expects, so we follow both.

Who counts as an endorser

The Know-hows applies to any celebrity, influencer or virtual influencer who has access to an audience and can influence their purchasing decisions or opinions about a product, service, brand or experience. There is no follower threshold in that description. A creator with 8,000 followers who can sway buyers is covered in the same way as one with 800,000.

What the Know-hows asks for

PIB's summary gives four points.

• Prominent disclosure. Disclosures must be clear and hard to miss.
• A wide list of material connections. Benefits and incentives, monetary or other compensation, trips or hotel stays, media barters, coverage and awards, free products with or without conditions, discounts, gifts, and family, personal or employment relationships.
• Plain language. Terms such as "advertisement", "sponsored" or "paid promotion" can be used.
• Experience and due diligence. Endorsers should not endorse a product or service they have not personally used or experienced, or on which they have not done due diligence.

The list is broader than it looks. Free products count with or without conditions, so a PR box with no posting obligation still triggers disclosure if the creator posts about it. For the exact label words and where they go, see our post on influencer disclosure hashtags and labels.

Where ASCI and DoCA agree and differ

What the 2022 guidelines add

PIB's release of 10 June 2022 explains that the CCPA notified the guidelines under section 18 of the Consumer Protection Act 2019, and that "misleading advertisement" is already defined in section 2(28) of the Act. We have read PIB's description, not the guidelines' full text. These are the parts that touch creator content.

• Bait, surrogate and free-claim advertisements. The guidelines define bait and surrogate advertisements and set out what counts as a free claim. A giveaway post or an "offer" caption may amount to a free claim, so check the terms behind it.
• Disclaimers. A disclaimer must not hide material information whose omission would make an ad deceptive or conceal its commercial intent, and must not be used to correct a misleading claim. It must be in the same language as the claim and in the same font. That makes a tiny "T&C apply" line in a caption a poor defence.
• Children. Ads aimed at children must not exaggerate features in a way that creates unrealistic expectations, and must not make health or nutritional claims without adequate, scientific substantiation by a recognised body. They must not feature personalities from sports, music or cinema for products that require a health warning under any law or that children cannot buy. If you cast a celebrity creator for a kids' campaign, check this first.
• Duties. The guidelines set separate duties for manufacturers, service providers, advertisers and advertising agencies, and require due diligence before endorsing.

Penalties

You may see reports of a six-month endorsement ban. PIB's description of the 2022 guidelines does not say that. It gives one year and three years. We have not reviewed the statute's text, and we do not cover any other provision of the Consumer Protection Act 2019, including anything on imprisonment, because we could not verify it.

ASCI or the Authority: who actually acts

In practice, ASCI is the live risk and the CCPA is the backstop. ASCI processed 1,609 influencer ads in FY2025-26 and 97.3 percent needed modification. In its second check of Forbes India's Top 100 Digital Stars 2024, ASCI upheld 76 cases and escalated two to the Department of Consumer Affairs.

We found no published CCPA or DoCA enforcement action against a named influencer in 2025 or 2026, and no published outcome for the two escalated cases. That means the statutory route is thinly tested, which makes any prediction about how fines will be applied guesswork. It is not a reason to ignore it. In August 2023 DoCA said it would actively monitor and enforce the health guidelines, and the 2022 guidelines are in force.

Due diligence in practice

Due diligence sounds abstract until you write it down. For a creator post it has three steps: the creator uses the product, the brand supplies evidence for each claim, and anything the evidence does not support is cut before the post is made. The table shows what that looks like for common claims. These are our working examples, not rulings.

For celebrity-tier creators, ASCI's separate Guidelines for celebrities in advertising (13 July 2023) add a formal layer. They define a celebrity as a well-known person who is paid ₹40 lakh a year for ad appearances or has 500,000 or more followers on any single handle. They expect the celebrity to do due diligence on claims, and say the celebrity or their manager must give ASCI a signed written confirmation of it. Celebrities can also seek Endorser Due Diligence from ASCI on whether an ad potentially violates the code. If your plan includes celebrity and macro creators, build this in from the start.

A brand-side checklist

1. List every claim. Pull each claim out of the script or draft and number it.
2. Attach evidence. One document per claim. Remove any claim with none.
3. Check the product trial. The creator should have used it for a stated period, and the contract should say so.
4. Check the label. Put in the exact word and position, not "disclose as per law".
5. Check disclaimers. Same language and font as the claim, and not used to repair a misleading one.
6. Check the audience. If it includes children, review the 2022 guidelines' rules on health claims and on personalities.
7. Check the category. Health, finance and AI content carry extra rules, covered in our posts on health influencer rules and finfluencer rules.
8. Keep a record. Save the approved draft, the evidence file and the label wording with the contract.
9. Write the takedown right. The brand can require an edit or removal within 24 hours, and payment waits until it is done.
10. Review before ads. When a post becomes an ad, run the claims check again. See our guide to influencer contracts in India.

How we apply it

Our briefs carry a claims table, and each claim has a document behind it before a creator sees the script. Creators confirm in the contract that they have used the product. Every draft is reviewed for claims, labels and disclaimers before it goes live. For beauty and skincare brands and health and wellness brands, where claims carry the most risk, the evidence file is built before creators are briefed. See how we work, or send us a brief.

This is general information, not legal advice.