India’s plastic waste rules require companies to collect and process the equivalent of 100% of the plastic they put on the market by 2024-25. File. | Photo credit: KVS Giri
India’s latest amendment to its plastic waste management rules leaves the main recycling targets unchanged, but introduces a number of provisions that allow companies to push back compliance dates.
These provisions allow companies that do not meet their targets in 2025-26 to carry forward deficits for up to three years, provided they generate at least a third of the deficit each year. Previously, companies were required to comply annually.
“The unmet target for 2025-2026 may be carried over to three subsequent years beginning in 2026-27…provided that at least one-third of the unmet target is met in each of those years until the entire carried-over target is achieved,” the Environment Ministry gazette dated 31
The rules also formalize a system of tradable certificates that allow companies to meet their obligations by buying credits from others that exceed their targets. While this creates flexibility and can reduce compliance costs, it also means that businesses don’t necessarily have to recycle their own plastic footprint.
The targets also do not apply where other regulations – such as food safety standards – restrict the use of recycled plastics. This could exclude significant packaging segments from the mandate, particularly in the food and beverage sector.
The 2026 amendment maintains a phased set of targets for recycled content and reuse in plastic packaging and continues the trajectory first introduced under Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) in 2022, which for the first time set collection targets for producers of plastic waste and users of plastic packaging.
For 2025-26, manufacturers, importers and brand owners must ensure that rigid plastic packaging (Category I) contains at least 30% recycled material, rising to 60% by 2028-29. Flexible plastics (category II) are subject to a 10% requirement in 2025-26, rising to 20% thereafter, while multi-layered plastics (category III) must meet a 5% threshold, rising to 10%. At the same time, the rules mandate reuse obligations for rigid packaging: 10% for smaller containers (0.9-4.9 litres), 70% for large aqueous packaging and 10% for large non-aqueous packaging in 2025-26, with gradual increases over time.
Category 1 includes PET bottles for water or soft drinks or HDPE milk / shampoo bottles. These are the easiest to collect. Category 2 includes plastic bags / grocery bags, snack or chip packets (single-layer flexible film). Category 3 plastics or multi-layered plastics such as Tetra Pak cartons, tin foil packaging for snacks are the hardest to collect.
India’s plastic waste rules require companies to collect and process the equivalent of 100% of the plastic they put on the market by 2024-25, marking the final phase of implementing extended producer responsibility (EPR). However, there is no public evidence to suggest that this objective has been fully achieved in practice. No comprehensive public data set or official assessment demonstrates compliance across the system, and much reporting continues to rely on self-declaration through a centralized portal.
The Ministry of the Environment said that although recycling under the EPR has expanded significantly, it is still far from full coverage. More than 20.7 million tonnes of plastic packaging waste has been recycled since 2022, when the framework came into force. However, annual production remains high – about 4.13 million tons in 2022-2023 alone.
In 2023, the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) unearthed more than 6,00,000 fake pollution trading certificates from audits at four plastic recycling companies in Gujarat, Maharashtra and Karnataka.
Published – 03 Apr 2026 21:51 IST
