Abstract
The Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI) is a voluntary, self-regulatory body representing the advertising industry in India. It was established in 1985, and it is registered as a non-profit company under Section 8 Companies Act. The main task of ASCI is to promote responsible advertising and safeguard consumer interests. ASCI ensures that advertisements comply with its Code for Self-Regulation, which mandates that all advertising must be legal, decent, honest, and truthful, and must not be harmful or hazardous, while also maintaining fairness in competition. ASCI addresses complaints across all forms of media, including print, television, radio, outdoor advertising, SMS, websites, product packaging, brochures, promotional materials, and point-of-sale displays. Its role has been widely recognized by several Government bodies such as the Department of Consumer Affairs (DoCA), the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI), the Ministry of AYUSH, and the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting. The rate of influencer marketing, especially in the fashion and luxury industries of India, has been growing exponentially without the establishment of credible regulatory enforcing regulatory bodies. Although the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI) has set reasonable regulations that require paid partnerships to be reported, its self-regulatory nature restricts its enforcement abilities causing a high level of compliance loopholes. Recurring non-disclosure, as it is seen in the 2025 report released by ASCI where the rate of non-disclosure among the top influencers is 69 percent, compromises the autonomy of the consumer and destroys market trust. The study uses a multidisciplinary approach, which entails, the analysis of legal frameworks through doctrine, the comparative analysis of international regulatory models and empirical information acquired through semi-structured interviews with fashion and luxury influencers. The paper finds an essential lack of enforceability that is due to the absence of statutory sanctioning power of the formulation of guidelines by ASCI, operational issues in the work of guidelines, and perception among content creators.
Keywords- Advertisements, choices, consumer, economy, eco-system, fashion, social media
Synopsis
The major issues that arise from such undisclosed advertisements are misleading or false representation, concealment of facts, and the endangerment of consumer rights. The deception is very high not only the masses are fooled but also many times their counterfeit products available in the market. To protect the rights of the consumer many enactments have come into existence. Such as The Consumer Protection Act 2019, The Consumer Protection Act 2019, addresses misleading acts under section 2(8) and imposes penalties that may be a fine for 10 Lakhs for the first offence and up to 50 lakhs [1] for repeated offences. The enforcement in the digital sphere is dependent on the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI), a voluntary self-regulatory organisation registered as a company under section 8 of the Companies Act. In the ASCI’s Influencer Advertising and Discloser Guidelines [2] introduced in 2021 and later revised in 2023, mandate that influencers must clearly disclose paid partnerships through hashtags such as #ad or #sponsored. It however is important to note that the ASCI does not have enforcement powers, this makes it a challenge to ensure the effectiveness of the regulations. According to ASCI’s 2025 Top Influencer Compliance Scorecard [3]69% of India’s top 100 online influencers violate disclosure guidelines, along with fashion and lifestyle making up for 27.5% of violations. Moreover, the scope of this issue extends to all 11 crore followers [4] exposed to undisclosed brand promotions, making regulation even more complex.
As discussed above in the abstract that ASCI works in collaborations, ASCI works to co-regulate and curb misleading or objectionable advertisements in various sectors. In January 2017, the Supreme Court of India affirmed ASCI’s self-regulatory mechanism as an effective, pre-emptive measure supplementing statutory regulation of advertising content on television and radio. Internationally, ASCI is a member of the Executive Committee of the International Council on Ad Self-Regulation (ICAS). It has also received several accolades from the European Advertising Standards Alliance (EASA), including two Gold Global Best Practice Awards—one for its “ASCI online” mobile app (2016) and another for significantly reducing complaint-processing time (2013).
However, in the advent of the boom of social media, this paper seeks to analyse the extent of regulation that ASCI’s paid partnership rules are able to regulate advertising on social media. Influencer marketing is defined as a paid collaboration between a brand aiming to promote their services and a content creator; this exists throughout different platforms like Reddit, Youtube, Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest.
[1] TaxTMI, Misleading Advertisements in India: A Legal and Ethical Perspective, TAXTMI (undated), https://www.taxtmi.com/article/detailed?id=14226
[2] ASCI, Guidelines for Influencer Advertising in Digital Media, Cl. 1.1 (Aug. 17, 2023).
[3] ASCI, Top Influencer Compliance Scorecard 2025: Compliance Review of Forbes Top 100 Digital Stars in India 2 (Feb. 2025).
[4]Campaign India, 69% of India’s Top Influencers Violate Disclosure Guidelines: ASCI, CAMPAIGN INDIA (undated), https://www.campaignindia.in/article/69-of-indias-top-influencers-violate-disclosure-guidelines