New Delhi, Oct 30 (PTI) The Central Consumer Protection Authority (CCPA) has imposed a penalty of Rs 10 lakh on Just Dial Ltd for listing and facilitating the sale of Ammonium Nitrate, a statutorily classified explosive, on its platform without ensuring mandatory regulatory safeguards.
In its October 28 order, CCPA Chief Commissioner Nidhi Khare directed the company to immediately stop listing, hosting, advertising, promoting or facilitating access to or sale of Ammonium Nitrate, or any other substance classified as an explosive under the Explosives Act, 1884, or otherwise regulated under any applicable law.
Just Dial has also been asked to submit a compliance report within 15 days of receiving the order.
The authority said it was imposing the maximum penalty prescribed for a first contravention under Section 21 of the Consumer Protection Act, citing "the nature and gravity of the violations, the vulnerability of consumers and the public at large", the platform's pan-India reach, the duration for which the listing stayed up, and the company's failure to cooperate with the investigation or demonstrate any legal action against the seller.
The regulator said the substance was "not an ordinary consumer good" and that its unregulated availability carried grave implications for public safety and national security. This, it said, placed the violation in a "materially different category from an ordinary misleading advertisement".
It also flagged that the listing carried imagery depicting an explosion, which it said reflected "not merely a passive lapse" but content that could induce consumer interest and a serious failure of content moderation.
The CCPA noted that Just Dial operates at pan-India scale, with about 54.7 million listings and 192.9 million quarterly unique users by its own figures. The impugned listings related to sellers in several states and were freely accessible to the public.
The company also earned subscription revenue through paid campaigns linked to sellers whose Ammonium Nitrate listings were identified, without verifying the regulated status of the product being promoted.
According to the order, Just Dial failed to maintain or produce records backing its claim of due diligence, including data on quantities sold and licences verified. It also produced no evidence that its KYC, content moderation and audit mechanisms actually functioned.
Beyond removing the listings, the company took no action against the sellers and, as it admitted, did not report the matter to the Petroleum and Explosives Safety Organisation (PESO) or any other authority.
The CCPA pointed to what it called contradictory stands taken by the company. Just Dial described itself as a passive directory while promoting listings for a fee; said it was barred from moderating vendor information while also claiming automated moderation; and stated that no Ammonium Nitrate category was active even though its own response showed several of the listed sellers as "Active".
The listings, which by the company's own account were three to 20 years old, remained available until regulatory intervention, the authority noted, despite the licensing and traceability requirements under the Ammonium Nitrate Rules, 2012 having been in force for well over a decade.
The company was unavailable for comments on the matter.
