Mumbai, Nov. 17 -- The government on Monday restricted imports of unstudded articles of platinum jewellery until 30 April 2026, following the misuse of the zero per cent import clause.

Until now, such articles, with 90% gold content, could be freely imported. However, some traders were importing these at zero duty from Indonesia under the India-Asean free trade agreement over the past few weeks and converting them into gold bars, evading the 6% duty on gold imports, according to Surendra Mehta, national secretary, India Bullion and Jewellers Association (IBJA), the nodal bullion trade body.

This was causing a massive loss to the exchequer, Mehta added.

"The Import Policy. is revised from 'free' to 'restricted', with immediate effect ti...