Bridging the gap between LED standards & their enforcement

Multiple perspectives have emerged as we began the series on ‘Lab Testing: The Way Ahead for LED Displays?’ turning the spotlight on the need to test LED screen standards: what to test, why, and how, with insights from industry players.  

In this conversation with Rajneesh Rawat, Managing Director at Orion LED, highlights the need to enforce standards that already exist.   

A mandate that already exists, on paper 

Asked whether India needs to establish a performance standard, Rajneesh’s answer was immediate. “It is mandatory now,” he said. “That’s why you’re always told to buy a standard product, one that carries the right certifications.” In his telling, certifications like CE, ISO and BIS aren’t just safety paperwork, they’re meant to confirm a product has gone through a defined set of tests, performance included, before it’s sold. “There are a few tests which are mandatory for performance also,” he said. “But that’s a one-time process, done for certification. There are people who are just buying and selling products who don’t go through the entire set of tests.” 

That distinction matters. What’s mandatory, in his account, is largely tied to import compliance, a product can’t legally enter the country without clearing certification. “The government has already made it mandatory,” he said. “You cannot import without certification. If you don’t have the licence, you cannot bring the product into the country.” Brightness, notably, sits outside that mandate. “Brightness is not mandatory, but it is very essential,” he said, and added, “Checking it requires equipment few manufacturers actually own. It’s an expensive instrument. Not many people have it to test the brightness.” His suggestion for those without it is straightforward, go to a third-party lab or validator instead. 

Where the mandate actually breaks down 

If the rule exists, the obvious next question is why it doesn’t show up in the market. As Rajneesh pointed out, “The government has made certification mandatory, but importers are still finding ways to bring products in without it, and that’s something the government needs to address. On our part, we can’t do much about it.” 

Why a bad screen looks fine for months 

The part of the conversation that stood out most was about how little a buyer can actually tell just by looking at a screen. Asked what separates a good product from a bad one, Rajneesh described a problem that no certification, in his view, fully solves. “It’s a very tricky thing,” he said. “If you make an X-quality product and a Y-quality product, in the initial period it’s hard to tell which one is good and which is bad. Only after six months, eight months, ten months, a year, do you find out which one actually lasts.” 

That’s precisely why he keeps returning to certification and reputation as the only real proxy available to a buyer at the point of sale, not because paperwork guarantees quality, but because the product itself won’t reveal anything useful for months after the purchase is already final. 

The gap that’s left 

Put together, Rajneesh’s account describes a market where the paperwork and the product tell you two different things, at two different times. The certification, when it’s genuine, tells you something upfront, but it’s easy to go around, and plenty of importers do. The screen itself will eventually tell you the truth too, but only after it’s already been running for the better part of a year, by which point the buyer has little recourse left. Between those two points sits the actual decision a buyer has to make, with neither a fully enforced standard nor the product’s own performance available to lean on in time. For Rajneesh, that’s the real argument for sticking with certified, reputed manufacturers, not because the certificate is airtight, but because it’s the only signal a buyer gets before the six-month wait begins.