The Central Consumer Protection Authority (CCPA), an arm of the Union Consumer Affairs Ministry, has released draft guidelines for the “Prevention of misleading advertisement in coaching sector”, which bring such offences under the radar of the Consumer Protection Act. The CCPA has invited public comments on the three-page guidelines. The CCPA had formed a sub-committee to draft the guidelines earlier after discussions with several stakeholders. The last date for submitting suggestions is March 16.
The Ministry said in a release that the draft guidelines have been framed after detailed deliberations with all stakeholders including coaching institutes, law firms, government and voluntary consumer organisations. It has defined coaching as “tuition, instructions or academic support or learning programme or guidance” provided by any person. Any individual who engages in coaching shall be considered to be engaging in a misleading advertisement if important information related to the course, such as whether it is free or paid, and duration opted by the successful candidate, is concealed.
Such guidelines were initiated after widespread complaints against certain coaching centres for misusing the names and photos of successful candidates in various competitive examinations, including the civil services exam. Making false claims regarding success rates, number of selections, or rankings of students in any competitive exam without providing verifiable evidence, falsely representing students’ success as solely attributable to the coaching, without acknowledging the individual efforts of the students and creating false sense of urgency or fear of missing out that may heighten anxieties amongst students, or parents will be considered as misleading under the new guidelines.
“Guidelines would be made applicable to every person engaged in coaching. The objective of the Guidelines is to protect consumers from misleading advertisements in coaching sector. Thus, the proposed Guidelines seek to prevent such misleading advertisements which effects consumers as a class,” the Ministry said.
Stating or leading the consumers to believe that enrolment in coaching will guarantee the student a rank, high marks, temporary or permanent job, admissions to institutions, job promotions, salary increase, etc. will also be considered as misleading unless the coaching is able to substantiate the claims.
