Beyond the Green Facade: New Challenges in Detecting and Preventing Greenwashing in Indian Companies

Abstract The increasing demand for environmentally sustainable products has led to adoption of green marketing strategies by many Indian companies. The green marketing strategies aimed at appealing to environmentally conscious consumers. While this trend reflects a positive side of environmental awareness, it has also given rise to the practice of greenwashing, which is a deceptive tactic where businesses falsely present their products or services as environmentally friendly. Greenwashing not only erodes consumer trust but also negatively affects the genuine efforts towards sustainability. The chapter focuses on the environment issue of detecting and preventing greenwashing in today’s era. By investigating the methods some companies misrepresent their sustainability claims, this study emphasizes on the challenges faced by regulators, consumers, as well as the organizations striving to uphold authentic sustainable practices. A qualitative research approach is being done in this study. It examines the documented cases of greenwashing across various industries by using secondary data from scholarly articles, reports, and the regulatory frameworks. Furthermore, this study anticipates the increasing complexity of the greenwashing techniques, which is making them more difficult to identify. It is expected to reveal significant gaps in existing regulatory frameworks and to emphasize the need for stronger and at the same time, more effective standards. The research also highlights the importance of an informed and rational consumer base in holding companies accountable for their sustainability claims.