India has become a kind of El Dorado for the global spirits industry. With multinational groups now getting used to the idea of having to share a smaller pie, the Indian subcontinent has become a market where massive growth is still attainable. So, when the Food Safety & Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) began removing some of the country’s biggest spirits brands from shelves in early August, there must’ve been quite the sinking feeling.
Historically, India has had permissive definitions of whisky and rum. The first official outline dates back to 2018 when the FSSAI published its first dedicated Alcohol Beverage Regulation in which it stated that, alongside sugar-derived alcohol, rum “may also be prepared from neutral, rectified, distilled spirit of agricultural origin”, while whisky “can use neutral grain spirit, rectified grain spirit or neutral agricultural spirit”.
In both cases, the use of neutral spirit is permitted, but crucially it states that each category should “possess the characteristic taste and aroma associated with the product”.
It also outlined definitions for the ageing of spirits where “any alcoholic beverage when labelled as ‘matured’, shall be matured for a period of not less than one year in oak or other suitable wood vats or barrels or with wooden chips. Where an age claim is made in conjunction with the word “aged”, the age must refer to the youngest spirit in the blend”.
For several years, the implementation of the official regulations didn’t appear to have much of an impact on the burgeoning IMFL category.
That was until July 2026, when the FSSAI reportedly told Diageo that Royal Challenge, an Indian whisky that sold 10.6 million cases in 2025 according to Drinks International’s Millionaires’ Club, that its “matured in American oak casks” claim was misleading to consumers as the product mostly contained unmatured spirit.
While mostly unreported at the time, this represented a shift in the approach of the FSSAI and paved the way for a crackdown in early August that saw the regulator serve stop-sale actions to United Spirits/Diageo, Inbrew, Mohan Rocky Springwater and Associated Alcohol & Breweries for products including Royal Challenge,
Antiquity Blue, McDowell’s No.1 Rum, Bagpiper Deluxe, Old Cask and three Old
Monk variants. In its report, the FSSAI said laboratory testing had found additional flavours that mask the products’ natural profile which the regulator asserted “contravenes the regulation stating that these products must exclusively possess their true, natural characteristic taste and aroma”.
The regulator also stated that Old Monk XXX, which ranks among the country’s favourite distilled alcohol products, contained less than 5% matured rum spirits and therefore could not legally make its seven-year-old blend claim.
EMERGING POSITION
India’s rules themselves permit rum to be made from neutral agricultural spirit and whisky from neutral or rectified spirit, so that’s not the scandal here. FSSAI’s emerging position instead is that a producer can’t take a largely neutral alcohol base and add flavours to reproduce the character of whisky or rum and then present the product as being derived from conventional production.
In response, Diageo challenged the action against McDowell’s No.1 Celebration rum, arguing that proper process had now been followed but, less than a week later, government sources told Reuters that Diageo had agreed to reformulate its Antiquity
Blue and Royal Challenge whiskies and its McDowell’s No. 1 Celebration rum. Reportedly the reformulation sees the removal of whisky-in-whisky and rum-in-rum flavouring with added flavour more clearly labelled during the transition.
Later, the FSSAI scrutiny reached Pernod Ricard with reports that inspectors spent several days at a Bengaluru plant, the site of Royal Stag and Blenders Pride production. But no adverse findings have been filed against Pernod at time of publication.
Then at the beginning of September, the FSSAI told the Bombay High Court that Old Monk could not be sold as ‘rum’ given its current formulation.
How Old Monk ultimately changes its label is relatively immaterial. What’s significant is that the FSSAI has established that category identity must come from the liquid’s production rather than from flavouring.
If that principle becomes settled law and is applied consistently, it potentially changes recipes, labelling and economics across parts of the world’s strongest major growth market.
