Abstract

Over the last few decades, advertising has become ubiquitous to the extent that it has entered and influenced human life and society. The evolution of marketing above all factors, has targeted the consumer which resulted in an immense study of consumer behaviour and figuring out ways to alter consumer preferences to suit the interests of certain corporations. Advertising has been a key tool for marketing, it has advanced to greater extents to influence consumer attitudes towards a particular product. In the above context, it is rather pertinent to understand how advertisements have impacted consumers with reference to India given its population and and the fact that it is the third largest economy in the world in terms of purchasing power parity. There is much need for statutory regulation to prevent misuse of media platforms that promote false and misleading advertisements. With the introduction of the new Consumer Protection Act, 2019 many new aspects and areas of consumer protection have been brought into picture. These are the need of the hour given the changes that have taken place in the globalised consumer market since the previous legislation . These paper seeks to highlight one of these new aspects which is the introduction of the concept of liability for misleading and false advertising dealt with in Section 21 of the Act. The objective of this paper is to analyse and look into the specific features of Section 21 and some critical reflections of its provisions with due reference to the impact of advertising in Indian society.

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