New Delhi: Chinese manufacturers are increasingly faking popular Indian products of consumer goods giants such as Dabur and ITC, undermining the legitimacy of brands and causing losses worth as much as $5 billion (Dh18.36 billion) annually, officials said.
"A lot of counterfeit Dabur products are made in China. We have conducted at least 20 raids in China, but no proper action has been taken by the Chinese," Ashok Jain, general manager of finance at Dabur India, the country's fourth largest FMCG firm, said.
He said such fake products manufactured in China with a ‘Made-in-India' tag are supplied across the world, mostly in India and African countries. "It causes huge damage to the brand. Those fake products are obviously not up to our standards and supplied at very low prices," Jain told IANS.
Pradeep Dixit, a senior official of ITC, a $33-billion conglomerate, said the popular FMCG brands of the company were counterfeited by unscrupulous firms and supplied in domestic as well as foreign markets. "Our popular cigarette brand is faked and supplied in states like Chhattisgarh, Bihar and Uttar Pradesh," he said.
"China is a big problem everybody is facing," S.K. Goel, chairman of the Central Board of Excise and Customs, told IANS. Goel said the big international brands like Nokia, Adidas, Reebok and Nivea were also counterfeited in China and supplied in India and other parts of the world.
Chinese manufacturers are also faking drugs and endangering lives of patients. Fake drugs, carrying ‘Made in India' tags, supplied from China were recently seized in Nigeria and other African countries.
K.K. Vyas, Delhi's deputy commissioner of police (crime), said the police recently seized and confiscated a lot of fake and counterfeited products of popular brands in Delhi. Vyas emphasised the need to enhance punishment for unscrupulous manufacturers and importers. "Punishment needs to be enhanced."
