Thousands of SDCs uploaded as Supreme Court’s new ad directive takes effect

Advertisers have started complying with a Supreme Court directive to curb misleading ads and false claims by using the Self-Declaration Certificate (SDC) mechanism.

Approximately 6,000 SDCs were uploaded on the Press Council of India's portal and around 700 on the Broadcast Seva portal, both established by the Ministry of Information & Broadcasting (MIB). 

Following the Supreme Court's May 7, 2024, order requiring all advertisers and advertising agencies to submit an SDC before publishing or broadcasting any ad, the MIB mandated this process and introduced new features on the Broadcast Seva Portal for TV and radio ads, and the Press Council of India’s portal for print and digital/online ads at the start of the month.

The certificate, which must be signed by an authorized representative of the advertiser or agency, is submitted via these portals.

Marketers and ad agencies have faced challenges and concerns about the tight implementation deadline and the portal's performance issues while generating these SDCs.

Advertisers from various sectors including FMCG, automobile, broadcasters, BFSI, consumer durables, and D2C players have submitted SDCs. On the PCI portal, notable advertisers included Emami's Dermicool, Hyundai, GMR, Daawat Basmati, Nestle's Maggi, and D2C players like Country Delight and Slurrp. BFSI clients included HDFC Life, Bajaj Allianz Life, BharatPe, and Upstox.

The Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI) also uploaded a declaration for its 'responsible advertising course.'

On the MIB portal, Star India Pvt Ltd generated over 20 SDCs. However, about 20% of the SDCs uploaded so far were testers and dummies, indicating that advertisers are still familiarizing themselves with the portal.

Given the vast scale of advertising, advertisers have expressed concerns over the tight timeline, which leaves little time for testing the portal and the process.

In the past two weeks, industry bodies like the Indian Society of Advertisers and the Indian Broadcasting & Digital Foundation have requested a 45-day extension for compliance and have met with the MIB, but no resolution has been reached.

On July 9, the MIB will submit an affidavit to the Supreme Court detailing the actions taken so far regarding SDCs and will present stakeholders' reactions to the mandatory SDC directive and mechanism.