View AbstractPlant genetic engineering is an incredibly important tool to study the gene regulation, plant development and produce resistant varieties against various abiotic and biotic stresses. Genetic transformation of plants in addition to target gene also requires a highly specific promoter for the specific and temporal expression of the target gene. In crop biotechnology, transgene is commonly driven by, constitutive promoters, such as CaMV 35S (cauliflower mosaic virus), or its derivatives. Such promoters are in use for long, although they efficiently drive the expression of genes but are associated with a number of unwanted problems such as homology-dependent gene silencing, altered plant development or morphology and are constitutively expressed at high levels throughout the plant even in the absence of the inducers (abiotic or biotic stress). To overcome this burden, tissue or organ specific and inducible promoters can be used to drive transgene expression. Various tissue specific promoters such as leaf-specific promoter, phloem-specific promoter, root-specific promoter, fruit-specific promoter, specific promoter and flower specific promoter have been isolated and characterized earlier. The variations in the expression of stress inducible genes are a result of the architecture of the promoters. Expression of transgene under the control of stress-inducible promoters is in demand and is preferred to produce transgenic plants having resistance to multiple stresses. This review highlights the advantages and disadvantages of constitutive promoters and the need for inducible promoters.