How to Read Nutrition Labels in India: 5 Things to Check (With Examples)

Pick up any packet of "multigrain" biscuits, "high-protein" breakfast cereal, or "no added sugar" fruit juice from an Indian supermarket. The front of the pack is all persuasion: bold claims, green ticks, wheat fields, happy athletes. Flip it over and the nutrition label looks like a maths exam nobody prepared for.

Most of us read the front. Very few read the back, and that gap is where a lot of food marketing works.

Here is how an Indian nutrition label is laid out, which tricks make bad numbers look better, and a check you can run in the aisle in about 10 seconds. You do not need a nutrition degree.

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1. Why Packaging Claims Work So Well

Packaged food is a very large market in India, and every brand in it knows the front of the pack sells and the back does not. So the front carries claims ("baked not fried", "zero cholesterol", "source of calcium") and the actual numbers sit in small print on the reverse.

It works because most of us were never shown how to read a label. These are the usual ways people get misled:

• Health halos: A product with "oats" in the name automatically feels healthy, even if oats are the sixth ingredient after refined flour, sugar, and palm oil.
• Misleading serving sizes: The nutrition panel shows values for 30g, but the packet contains 200g. Nobody eats 30g of chips.
• Sugar aliases: Sugar appears under 10+ different names on Indian labels. Companies split it across multiple ingredients so no single item ranks first on the list.
• Protein inflation: Total protein is listed, not usable protein. A biscuit claiming 3g protein per serving sounds great until you understand that grain-based protein has very low digestibility.

You do not need to distrust every product. You just need to know where to look. Once you do, labels are useful.

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2. FSSAI Labelling Rules: What Must Be on the Pack

The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) sets what must appear on packaged food labels under the Food Safety and Standards (Labelling and Display) Regulations, 2020.

A packaged food sold in India must show:

• Product name: what the food actually is, not a brand name
• List of ingredients: in descending order by weight
• Nutritional information: per 100g or 100ml, and per serving
• Allergen declaration: the major allergens, such as milk, egg, fish, shellfish, tree nuts, peanuts, gluten-containing cereals and soy, must be declared
• Net quantity
• Manufacturer details
• Best before / use by date
• FSSAI licence number
• Country of origin
• Veg / Non-veg symbol: the green dot (veg) or brown dot (non-veg)

FSSAI has been moving towards clearer front-of-pack labelling for foods high in fat, sugar and salt (HFSS). Rollout has been uneven and many packs still carry no such marking, so check the current FSSAI position and do not rely on the front of the pack alone.

For our purposes the most useful part is the Nutritional Information table. Companies cannot make up these numbers, but they can present them in a way that is easy to misread.

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3. Per 100g vs Per Serving: The Trick That Hides Calories

This is the part of the label that is misread most often.

FSSAI requires that nutritional values be shown both per 100g and per serving. The catch is that companies pick the "serving size" themselves, and for most food categories there is no fixed standard.

Take a cream biscuit pack. The label lists a serving as 2 biscuits (about 25g), and the full packet holds 200g, which is 16 biscuits or 8 servings. The label shows:

• Calories per serving: 118 kcal
• Sugar per serving: 6.2g

Those numbers sound acceptable. Now look at per 100g:

• Calories per 100g: 472 kcal
• Sugar per 100g: 24.8g

If someone eats half a packet in an evening, which is entirely normal, they have consumed 472 kcal and nearly 25g of sugar from biscuits alone. That is about the WHO's ideal free-sugar limit for a whole day (25g on a 2000 kcal diet).

Rule: read the per 100g values first, then multiply by how much you actually eat.

The per 100g column also lets you compare two products fairly. Two breakfast cereals with different serving sizes become easy to compare.

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4. How to Spot Hidden Sugar on Indian Labels (10 Names Sugar Hides Under)

Ingredient lists are in descending order by weight. If sugar is the first or second ingredient, the product is mostly sugar. Some companies split it into several forms, so each one sits lower on the list even though together they add up to the biggest ingredient.

Here are the 10 most common names sugar hides under on Indian packaged food labels:

1. Sucrose: table sugar, just the chemical name
2. High fructose corn syrup (HFCS): common in biscuits, sauces, and ketchup
3. Dextrose: glucose derived from corn starch, used in energy drinks and sports foods
4. Maltose: found in malted milk drinks and cereals
5. Corn syrup solids: a dried form of corn syrup, used in powdered drinks
6. Invert sugar: a mixture of glucose and fructose, very common in Indian mithai-inspired snacks
7. Maltodextrin: technically not classified as sugar in India, but metabolises like one; extremely common in protein powders, infant cereals, and health drinks
8. Jaggery / Khandsari: often used to signal "natural", but it affects blood sugar much like white sugar
9. Honey: frequently used in "healthy" granola bars and energy bars; still sugar
10. Fruit juice concentrate: used in "no added sugar" fruit drinks and breakfast bars; it is concentrated fruit sugar, legally different from "added sugar," but biochemically similar

A practical check: if sugars are listed separately, add them up. If the total goes past 10g per 100g in a savoury product or 15g per 100g in a snack, think twice.

If you want help applying this to your own goals, a nutritionist can go through labels with you and fit the advice to your health conditions.

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5. The Protein Quality Problem: Why a Biscuit's "3g Protein" Counts for Less

Protein is everywhere on packs right now, from biscuits to chips to breakfast cereals. The claims are usually true, but they tell you less than they seem to.

Here is why.

Indian labels report total protein, the crude amount worked out from nitrogen content. They do not report digestibility or amino acid completeness, and those decide how much of that protein your body can use.

One standard measure is PDCAAS, the Protein Digestibility Corrected Amino Acid Score, which runs from 0 to 1. A score of 1 means the protein is complete and fully digestible. Values below are approximate.

• Whey protein: PDCAAS ~1.0
• Egg white: PDCAAS ~1.0
• Milk protein: PDCAAS ~1.0
• Soya protein: PDCAAS ~0.91
• Wheat protein (gluten): PDCAAS ~0.25
• Rice protein: PDCAAS ~0.5

Now look at a typical "high-protein" multigrain biscuit: refined wheat flour, whole wheat flour and oats. The protein comes almost entirely from grains, with scores around 0.25 to 0.5. So the 3g on the label may be worth about 0.75g to 1.5g of usable protein.

A large egg has 6g of protein with a score of about 1.0, so all 6g is usable, and it costs roughly ₹8.

What to check instead: if protein matters to you, look in the ingredient list for whey, milk solids, egg or soya isolate. If it all comes from wheat flour and oats, the front-of-pack number is marketing.

See also: calorie count Indian foods, for protein and calories in common Indian meals compared with packaged alternatives.

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6. Trans Fat on Indian Labels: How Companies Hide It Legally

Industrial trans fats raise LDL cholesterol, lower HDL cholesterol and increase heart disease risk. Since January 1, 2022, FSSAI has capped industrial trans fat at 2% of total oils and fats in packaged foods.

So are trans fats gone from Indian food? Not quite. Two gaps remain:

Loophole 1: Rounding rules: FSSAI regulations allow manufacturers to list trans fat as "0g" if the product contains less than 0.2g of trans fat per serving. A company can set the serving small enough that trans fat per serving falls below 0.2g and print "0g Trans Fat". If you eat several servings, as most people do, it adds up.

Loophole 2: Naturally occurring trans fats: Ruminant-derived trans fats (from dairy and meat) are not covered by the PHVO ban. Butter or ghee in a product can add small amounts without any label warning.

How to check: Look at the ingredient list for "vegetable fat," "vanaspati," "partially hydrogenated," or "interesterified fat." These are warning signs. If you see them, the trans fat in what you actually eat may be higher than a "0g" label suggests.

Premium baked goods, Indian-style namkeen, and some imported biscuits are the highest-risk categories. A nutritionist near you can also help you work out which brands sold in your city are worth avoiding.

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7. Five Packaged Foods That Sound Healthier Than They Are

These are five categories where the pack and the numbers disagree the most.

1. "Multigrain" or "Whole Wheat" Biscuits
The first ingredient is almost always "refined wheat flour" (maida). The multigrain component (oats, ragi, jowar) appears at position 4 or 5, meaning it constitutes a tiny fraction by weight. One popular multigrain digestive biscuit lists 21g fat, 20g sugar and 462 kcal per 100g. That is a cookie with a health label.

2. Flavoured Breakfast Cereals
Corn flake variants marketed at children typically contain 30-37g sugar per 100g. To put that in context: Coca-Cola contains approximately 10.6g sugar per 100ml. Many "healthy" cereals have more sugar by weight than cola. Plain oats or plain bran flakes with your own fruit is a better start.

3. "No Added Sugar" Packaged Fruit Juices
Under FSSAI rules, "no added sugar" means no sucrose was added during manufacturing. It says nothing about naturally occurring fruit sugars or fruit juice concentrates. A 200ml carton of mango fruit drink with no added sugar can still deliver 20-24g of sugar, equivalent to 5-6 teaspoons. Whole fruit, with its fibre intact, is a different thing altogether.

4. Protein Bars
Many bars aimed at gym-goers have 15-20g sugar each (from dates, honey, glucose syrup) alongside the protein. Some use a lot of maltodextrin, which has a higher glycaemic index than table sugar. Read the total sugar and the ingredient list, not just the protein number on the front.

5. Flavoured Yogurt
Plain dahi is an excellent food. Flavoured yogurt, especially the fruit-on-the-bottom and the strawberry/mango varieties sold in single-serve cups, frequently contains 12-18g sugar per 100g. Some flavoured yogurts have more sugar per 100g than a chocolate biscuit. Check the sugar line before you buy.

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8. The 10-Second Label Test

Nobody has 5 minutes for every label in a supermarket. This is the quick version.

Step 1: Flip to the back immediately (2 seconds). Do not read the front until you have checked the back. The front is advertising and the back is data.

Step 2: Find the per 100g column (1 second). Skip the per-serving column for now.

Step 3: Check these four numbers in order (4 seconds):

• Calories: Above 400 kcal per 100g = energy-dense. Fine for occasional use, not daily staples.
• Sugar: Above 10g per 100g in a savoury food = high. Above 15g per 100g in any food = check carefully.
• Sodium: Above 600mg per 100g = high salt. Daily limit is approximately 2000mg (about 5g of salt).
• Saturated fat: Above 5g per 100g = significant. Above 10g per 100g = high.

Step 4: Glance at the ingredient list first three items (2 seconds). The first three ingredients make up the majority of the product by weight. If refined flour, sugar or vegetable oil is in the first three, that is what the product is made of, whatever the front says.

Step 5: One question (1 second): Do I recognise these ingredients as food? A label with 20 or more ingredients, mostly emulsifiers, stabilisers and artificial flavours, is a long way from whole food.

If a product fails two or more of these checks, put it back. There is usually a better option on the same shelf, with fewer ingredients and less sugar.

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A Note on Context

Reading labels is a useful habit, but it is not a treatment. If you live with diabetes, PCOS, a thyroid condition or heart disease, you may have specific limits that a general guide cannot cover. Numbers that are fine for a healthy 25-year-old may not suit someone on medication.

Knowing how to read a label is the first step. Knowing which numbers matter for your own situation is where your doctor or a nutritionist can help.

For help building a diet around your own numbers, you can talk to a nutritionist or find one in your city. Support is online, so you can start from wherever you are.

Sources: FSSAI Food Safety and Standards (Labelling and Display) Regulations, 2020; FSSAI order limiting industrial trans fat to 2% from 1 January 2022; WHO guideline on sugars intake (2015); FAO/WHO protein quality evaluation report (1991) for PDCAAS.

FAQ

Should I read per 100g or per serving on an Indian nutrition label?

Start with per 100g. Companies choose their own serving size, so the per serving column can make a product look lighter than it is. Read per 100g first, then multiply by how much you actually eat.

How can I tell if a packaged food has hidden sugar?

Read the ingredient list, which is in descending order by weight. Look for sucrose, dextrose, maltose, invert sugar, corn syrup, honey, jaggery and fruit juice concentrate. If several of them appear, add them up. More than 10g per 100g in a savoury product, or 15g per 100g in a snack, is worth a second look.

Does "no added sugar" mean a food has no sugar?

No. It only means sugar was not added during manufacturing. Fruit juice concentrate and naturally present sugars can still bring a carton of juice to 20g or more per 200ml, so check the total sugar line.

Is the protein number on a biscuit or cereal pack reliable?

The number is a total, not a measure of how much your body can use. Protein from wheat and oats is less complete and less digestible than egg, milk, whey or soya. Check which ingredients the protein comes from.

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