BIS meet at PVG discusses print standards

This was the first meeting that was conducted in person in the post-Covid 19 era with the chairman of the committee, Savitribai Phule Pune University Press Manager and Examination Department Special Task Officer, Dr Dattatray Kute, the member secretary of this committee of BIS, assistant director Lokraj Meena plus the presence of other committee members.

Sunil Redekar, chairman of Pune Vidyarthi Griha welcomed the members of the committee. He highlighted the work that PVG has conducted in the field of printing.

During the meeting, offset printing machinery, CTP plates, digital printing machines, rubber rollers, and other topics were discussed. An action plan was formed by creating small working study groups. The production head of Sakal, Prasad Pathak; the production head of Times of India, Navneet Ahuja; the former president of the All India Federation of Master Printers, Ravindra Joshi, the representative of IPAMA, Datta Deshpande; Dr Anjan Baral from Guru Jambheshwar University Hisar Haryana University; as well as Security Printing and Meeting Corporation of India’s Deepak Verma plus Anna University’s head of department of printing, Dr K Senthil were part of the meeting.

BIS involves different stakeholders — consumer organisations, industry, regulatory bodies, academia, R&D institutions — in the BIS Standard formulation process. Individuals can also comment on the draft standards which are circulated for consideration. BIS promotes its standards through various forums, such as industry meet, webinars, lecture series in universities, colleges and schools, Standards club in schools, awareness creation among self-help groups, and so on.

During the meet at PVG, students were given an opportunity to participate in the meeting. The chairman of the committee Dr Dattatreya Kute plus the members guided the students who were studying in the subjects of printing engineering and diploma about the opportunities and challenges related to the diverse fields in printing and the opportunities in the field. Later the committee members fielded questions from the students.

Dr Anjan Baral who was present during the meeting said, “The printing and publishing industry is in constant change. But there is always a silver lining in the dark cloud. The trend toward digital printing and publishing continues to grow and succeed. One should be prepared for the same, in order to sustain, grow and develop.”

He added, “Presently, MSD 6 is planning to develop standards in the areas such as process-free/process-less plates, digital print standards and sustainable printing substrates, etc, to benefit the printing and publishing industry at large.”

Every day, new products are added to the BIS certification scheme for licence in various fields, including, inks, papers, etc. Application for BIS certification is an online process and can be done through the website manakonline.in