As part of its wider crackdown on coaching instituted, the Central Consumer Protection Authority (CCPA) has imposed penalties of ₹7 lakh each on Vajirao & Reddy Institute and StudyIQ IAS, and ₹1 lakh on Edge IAS. These penalties have been imposed for advertising misleading claims regarding the results of the UPSC CSE 2022 and 2023.

So far, CCPA has issued 45 notices to various coaching institutes for misleading advertisements. The CCPA has imposed a penalty of ₹71.60 lakh on 22 coaching institutes and directed them to discontinue the misleading advertisements.

misleading claims

In the latest case, Vajirao & Reddy Institute was found to be making several misleading claims in its ads. It also prominently displayed successful candidate’s names & pictures and simultaneously advertised various types of paid courses on its official website. “However, the information with respect to the course opted by the said successful candidates in UPSC Civil Service exam 2022 was not disclosed in the abovementioned advertisement,” CCPA noted. The CCPA found out that all the claimed 617 successful candidates were enrolled only in the Interview Guidance Programme.

“By deliberately concealing about the specific course opted by each of the successful candidates, the Vajirao & Reddy Institute made it look like all the courses offered by it had the same success rate for the consumers, which was not right. These facts are important for the potential students to decide on the courses that may be suitable for them and should not have been concealed in the advertisement,” CCPA added.

CCPA stated that StudyIQ IAS is deliberately concealing the specific name of the course opted by the successful candidates created a misleading impression on consumers into making an uninformed choice about the quality of its service regarding the advertised courses, in which IGP has not been advertised at all. “StudyIQ IAS failed to substantiate its claim “Success Pakka Offer” and “Selection Pakka Offer” and also failed to submit Application/Enrollment/Registration forms & fee receipts of the claimed successful candidates of UPSC CSE 2023,” it added.

It further added that Edge IAS in its published advertisement prominently carried pictures and names of 13 successful candidates of UPSC Civil Service Exam 2023 while also concealing important information such as the course opted by them.

“CCPA has observed that several coaching institutes use the same successful candidate’s names and photographs in their advertisements while deliberately concealing important information about specific courses opted by them to create a deception that the successful candidates were regular classroom students at coaching institute,” it said.