A hallmark is an official certification of the purity of a precious metal article. In India it is administered by the Bureau of Indian Standards, and hallmarking of gold jewellery and artefacts has been made mandatory for sellers in notified districts, with the scheme expanded in stages since 2021.
The point of it is simple. Gold is sold by weight and priced by purity, and without an independent mark you have no way to verify what you are actually buying. A piece sold as 22 carat that is really 18 carat overstates the metal content by a large margin, and the difference is not visible to the eye.
What the mark actually contains
Since the introduction of the HUID system, a hallmarked gold article carries three marks:
The BIS logo, a standard triangular mark identifying the Bureau of Indian Standards.
The purity and fineness, such as 22K916, 18K750 or 14K585. The number is parts of gold per thousand.
A six-digit alphanumeric HUID, the Hallmark Unique Identification code, which is unique to that individual article and is recorded against the jeweller who registered it.
The HUID is the part that changed the system meaningfully. It is verifiable: the BIS Care app lets you enter the six-digit code and see the registered details of that specific piece, including the jeweller and the purity it was certified at. If a code does not verify, walk away.
Reading purity by the numbers
| Carat | Fineness | Gold content | Common use |
|---|---|---|---|
| 24K | 999 | 99.9% | Coins and bars, too soft for jewellery |
| 22K | 916 | 91.6% | Traditional Indian gold jewellery |
| 18K | 750 | 75% | Diamond and studded jewellery |
| 14K | 585 | 58.5% | Lighter and more durable pieces |
Pure 24 carat gold is too soft to hold a setting, which is why jewellery is alloyed. That is legitimate. The problem is only ever a piece being sold as a higher purity than it is.
A worked example of what purity is worth
Take 10 grams sold to you as 22 carat when it is actually 18 carat.
At 22K the metal is 91.6% gold, so 10 grams contains 9.16 grams of gold. At 18K it is 75%, so 7.5 grams.
You have paid for 9.16 grams of gold and received 7.5 grams, a shortfall of 1.66 grams. That is an overpayment of about 18% of the metal value, on top of whatever making charges were added. On a Rs 60,000 purchase that is roughly Rs 11,000 gone, invisibly.
This is exactly the loss the hallmark exists to prevent, and it is why the six-digit code being verifiable matters more than the mark simply being present.
Making charges are a separate question
Hallmarking certifies purity. It says nothing about price. Making charges of 8% to 25% are still added on top of the metal value, and they are almost never recovered when you sell. A jeweller buying back a piece typically pays for the gold content at the prevailing rate, minus a deduction, and returns nothing for the craftsmanship you paid for.
That is the core reason jewellery is a poor investment even when it is perfectly hallmarked, and why gold held for investment is better owned as a Sovereign Gold Bond or a gold ETF, which carry no making charges at all.
What to check at the counter
Ask to see the HUID and verify it in the BIS Care app before paying, not after. Get an invoice that states the net gold weight separately from the weight of any stones, the purity in carats, the making charges as a distinct line and the applicable GST. Stones are commonly weighed as part of the gross weight and charged at the gold rate, which is a well-known way of inflating a bill.
Keep the invoice. It is what establishes your purchase cost when you eventually sell, which matters for capital gains, and it is what a jeweller will ask for during a buyback or exchange.
Complaints about a piece that does not match its hallmark can be raised with BIS through the BIS Care app, which is a genuine and usable route rather than a theoretical one. For the wider question of how much gold to hold and in what form, see the gold hub.