UPSC Civil Services Coaching: Consumer Rights Authority Issues Ultimatum, Imposes Penalty To Institute Over Misleading Advertisements

CCPA or Central Consumer Protection Authority, a central government body which is working to safeguard the rights of consumers, issued an order to IQRA IAS Institute to discontinue some false claims under the garb of misleading testimonials and imposed the penalty of Rs 1,00,000 for misleading advertisement and unfair trade practice.

The Authority said the institute had published some advertisements with misleading testimonials of top-rank holders of the years 2015-2017 in the UPSC Civil Services Exam.

The issue came to the notice of the Authority through the website of IQRA IAS Institute established in 2018 that deliberately and falsely claimed through the testimonials of top-rank holders of UPSC CSE in 2015 and 2017 as their students which is factually deceiving.

“Therefore, CCPA took suo-moto cognizance and found that along with the aforesaid false claim the institute claimed itself as the only coaching academy to have the best faculty from all around India for providing the best UPSC online prelims test series 2020, thus making it the top UPSC coaching within a year in Pune,” a statement from the consumer affairs ministry said.

The Authority had issued a notice in this regard to IQRA IAS Institute.

The institute in its response to the CCPA had said the faculty members of Pune and Kanpur are highly qualified as well as reputed and have a Google rating of 4.6 out of 5. “The test series for the year 2020 was prepared with their high skills and research quality which was an academic success,” the Institute had told the Authority.

The advertisement has been removed from its website at present.

In CCPA’s investigation, according to the statement, it was found that the testimonials of All India Rank holders Tina Dabi AIR-1, (2015); Athar Amir Ul Safi Khan AIR-2, (2015); Himanshu Kaushik AIR-77, (2015); Saifin AIR-570, (2017) were hosted by IQRA IAS Institute which itself was set up in 2018 and deceived consumers into believing that such successful candidates owe their success to said institution.

“It is imperative to mention that IQRA IAS Institute by making such exaggerated claims not only falsely represented its service by deliberately concealing important information but also conveyed express and implied representation to mislead the class of consumers for deceptively promoting their services. On the other hand, the IQRA IAS Institute nowhere showcased any disclaimer and failed to substantiate other claims made by them,” the statement said.