The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India has proposed a draft amendment that would stop products licensed or registered as ‘Analogue in Dairy Context’ from using the word ‘paneer’ in their nomenclature, labelling or marketing.
The proposal appears in a Gazette of India draft notification dated 22 September 2026 and was explained in a 24 September government release. It is a draft, not a current nationwide ban. FSSAI has invited objections and suggestions before it considers the proposal further.
What the draft would change
The draft would amend the Food Safety and Standards (Prohibition and Restrictions on Sales) Regulations, 2011. It proposes adding a paneer-specific clause covering products made with constituents not derived from milk.
The notification says products already licensed or registered under the ‘Analogue in Dairy Context’ category would have to discontinue the word ‘paneer’ in their names, labels and marketing. Its stated purpose is to prevent consumers from being misled about a product’s nature and composition.
This is a proposed naming and representation restriction. The draft does not say that all dairy analogue products would be removed from the market. If the rule is finalised, affected businesses would need to review product names, packaging and promotion. The final regulation and any implementation guidance would determine the exact compliance requirements.
What ‘analogue in dairy context’ means
An April 2025 FSSAI consultation paper cites the regulatory definition of an analogue in the dairy context. It is a product in which constituents not derived from milk replace part or all of a milk constituent, while the final product resembles a milk product in sensory qualities or function.
The same consultation said the existing framework already required distinct labelling for dairy analogues and restricted misleading use of dairy terms. It asked stakeholders whether prefixes such as ‘non-dairy’ or ‘analogue’ should accompany dairy terminology and whether food-service businesses should identify analogue ingredients more clearly.
The 2026 draft takes a paneer-specific approach. Instead of proposing a qualifying prefix for these products, it says analogue-category products should discontinue the word ‘paneer’ altogether in nomenclature, labelling and marketing.
The proposal is about identity, not a blanket safety finding
FSSAI’s stated rationale is to make a product’s nature and composition clearer to consumers. Neither the draft notification nor the government release establishes that every analogue product is unsafe, adulterated or nutritionally inferior.
Composition can differ between products, so any claim about nutrition or safety would require product-specific evidence. The supported distinction here is regulatory: whether non-milk constituents replace milk constituents and whether the product is represented as paneer.
What happens next
The draft notification says objections or suggestions can be sent to the Chief Executive Officer of FSSAI at FDA Bhawan, Kotla Road, New Delhi 110002, or by email to regulation@fssai.gov.in.
FSSAI says it will consider the draft after a 60-day period from the date copies of the Gazette notification are made available to the public. The authority will consider submissions received within the specified period. A final notification could retain or change the proposal.
Until a final rule is notified, readers and businesses should treat this as a consultation-stage proposal rather than an operative nationwide ban.
