In March 2025, I got a desperate call from the founder of an E-waste Importer based in Ahmedabad. His containers were held at customs. Why? He didn’t have a valid Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) authorization under the new e-waste rules. What stung the most? He…
I remember sitting across from the procurement head of a Fortune 500 pharma company. After months of discussion, it came down to one question: “Is your lab NABL accredited?” We weren’t. That one ‘No’ cost me a ₹2 crore contract. It stung. But that rejection…
In April 2025, a well-known plastic packaging company from Rajasthan approached us in panic. Their shipment to a major FMCG player was held up—why? They didn’t have an EPR registration or valid authorization from CPCB. No matter how clean their operations were, without CPCB registration…
I still remember the frantic call I got from a friend who runs a mid-sized electronics brand in Mumbai. The Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) had slapped him with a notice for non-compliance with EPR obligations—and he had no clue what Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR)…
Back in 2019, I tried handling our lab’s NABL accreditation process in-house. My logic? “We’re smart people—we’ll figure it out.” Spoiler: We didn’t. Endless revisions. Audit delays. Rejected applications. And a whopping ₹3.6 lakh in sunk costs later, we finally got approved—14 months late. When…
I’ll never forget the moment my pathology lab’s NABL application was rejected—after 9 months of effort and ₹2.2 lakhs spent. The problem? Our documentation was off. Staff weren’t trained. And our QMS? A Frankenstein of copied SOPs. That rejection hit hard. But it also pushed…
Back in 2018, I ran a pathology lab in Pune. Our team was confident—we had top-tier equipment, well-qualified staff, and solid test outcomes. So, when we applied for NABL accreditation, we thought it’d be a cakewalk. Wrong. Our application bounced back. Twice. The audit was…
Back in 2017, I was running a diagnostic lab in Lucknow. Business was steady, but we kept losing out on big contracts from hospitals and pharmaceutical companies. One meeting changed everything. A senior procurement officer told me flat out: “We only partner with NABL-accredited labs.”…
In 2016, I ran a well-equipped but unaccredited pathology lab in western Uttar Pradesh. We were doing decent volumes. But one day, we lost a corporate client who had been with us for over two years. Their reason? “We’ve moved all diagnostics to NABL-approved labs…
In early 2025, I got a frantic call from a founder friend whose e-commerce startup just got slapped with a ₹32 lakh penalty. Why? A minor data leak — an intern had exported user data to an unsecured sheet for a marketing campaign. It wasn’t…
I remember the night vividly. It was 2:17 AM, and I was scrolling through an email from a government advisory that mentioned “random DPDP audits” for digital-first businesses. I froze. Despite having written a privacy policy and run some internal checks, I had this sinking…
In late 2024, I got a call at 9:42 PM. It was from an old client — a founder running a successful D2C health supplement brand. His exact words were: “We just got a notice from the DPBI. Something about a data breach and a…