But there is also a crisis of survival. Today, one of the most important challenges facing Banarasi saree producers is that cheaper synthetic imitations are produced in the textile city of Surat, which is located in the Western Indian state of Gujarat. It has also been reported that traders frequently import Chinese silk cloth and sell them in the Indian markets as Banarasi sarees.² This illegal trade negatively impacts Banarasi producers, since Surat-made synthetic sarees and Chinese-made sarees are regularly passed off as Banarasi products in different markets across India.³ Not only are the motifs and patterns of Banarasi sarees ripped-off, and their best weavers poached by producers in Surat; much more problematically, these ‘Surat-made Banarasi-style sarees’ are produced at a fraction of the cost (due to the use of synthetic materials and polyester) in comparison to an ‘authentic’ silk Banarasi saree.⁴ It is quite intriguing that Banarasi saree producers have, so far, not contemplated legal action against producers, or traders, of Surat-made or Chinese-made Banarasi-style sarees for infringing on their registered GI. Instead, several Banarasi weavers are also seeking access to cheaper raw materials for their sarees on the basis of and assumption that, by reducing their production costs, they could better fend off the competition by producing cheaper replicas of their sarees. Moreover, these producers seek to reduce costs to compete against the other legitimate producers of GI-denominated Banarasi sarees.

However, this situation begs several questions: Why are (several) Banarasi saree producers choosing to compete in a race to the bottom rather than turning to the legal enforcement of their GI and encashing the premium value of their products protected by the GI? Moreover, what implications will this strategy of lowering the quality of the authentic Banarasi sarees have on those producers who may continue to use silk fibres and not choose to compete by diluting the brand? In other words, what are the obligations of GI producers in India and does the Indian GIs system protect GI producers against those members of the GI producers’ community who decide to turn to a lesser quality relying on the historical reputation of the GI products, that is, those who become ‘free-riders from within?’

Overall, the existence of a GI registration on a product is meant to enable producers within a collective group to capture a premium for their products by (also) preventing members of the group from arbitrarily changing the product quality. In this respect, a GI registration also aims at preventing members of the collective group from deciding to lower the quality of the products to compete with other GI producers, or producers of similar products outside the GI-denominated market, especially when consumers are agnostic or unaware about those distinctions. Hence, the case of Banarasi sarees reveals that (at least a considerable number of) GI holders are often not concerned about the loss of combined reputation of their GIs resulting from compromise on the distinctive quality. Unfortunately, such instances are not unique to Banarasi sarees in India.⁵ This sense of lack of agency among GI holders highlights the collective action problem that goes deep into the ambiguity surrounding what makes a particular GI unique and the lack of adequate quality control on the ground amongst many GI producers in India. Interestingly, some may argue that changing the composition of raw materials by a few entrepreneurial members of a GI club could be seen as innovation. Yet, when that innovation includes turning to cheaper materials and to synthetic fabrics for sarees historically woven with silk, it should more likely be regarded as a compromise of GI-product quality and a (self)dilution of the GI’s distinctiveness.⁶

Essentially, this debate comes down to the quality and characteristics that GI-denominated products are supposed to possess and that GIs are supposed to purport to consumers. Presently, however, almost all of the GI awareness campaigns in India seem to be focused only on the registration component of GIs.⁷ Even though the branding and promotion of GI products has started receiving some attention both on the domestic and international fronts,⁸ the Indian government and the surrounding legal and policy discourse on Indian GIs have, at least until now, completely ignored the introduction of quality-control and maintenance measures for goods produced under the GI tag. In many ways, it could be said that the Indian GIs regime promotes a system of ‘Vanity GIs’ where the registration of GIs is seen as an end in itself and a measure for brand promotion, with little attention being paid to the deep linkages between the registration of GIs and the quality control that should follow the registration. Instead, quality control – and in turn the function of GIs as guarantors of and symbols assuring product quality – is central to the success of the Indian GIs regime, and this chapter seeks to fortify this claim by identifying how the consumer perception of quality has a sharp influence on the economics of GIs.