CBI case against firms for importing spurious drugs

After Customs seized a Rs 72 lakh fake drug consignment, the CBI has registered a case against Mumbai and Gujarat-based companies for allegedly importing spurious drugs in large quantities from China.

In its FIR against the companies, the CBI alleged these firms were licensed importers of bulk drugs from registered manufacturers inChina, official sources said.



The agency claimed that these companies imported bulk drugs through China and Hong Kong-based companies which included Progesterone (used for gynaecological problems), Roxithromycin (antibiotic), Cimetidine (used for ulcer) and Cefotaxime Sodium Sterile (used to treat various infections).



The CBI alleged that these drugs were not manufactured by the registered manufacturers and the accused companies, in conspiracy with the export companies in China and Hong Kong, imported these drugs through Chennai sea port.



The documents and counterfeit property marks to show as if the drugs were made by original manufacturers were also used in the conspiracy, the CBI alleged.



The CBI, while booking the companies and others under various sections of Indian Penal Code, Drug and Cosmetics Act and Customs Act, alleged that the companies violated the drug import license by importing spurious drugs and also submitting fake declarations and documents, they said.



Union Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad, while taking a serious note of the flow of spurious drugs, had ordered for a CBI inquiry into the case.

A consignment of bulk drugs valued at about Rs 72 lakh was seized by Customs authorities at Chennai in August this year after it was suspected to have been imported from an unregistered source originating from China.

"There is an abject criminal and malafide attempt to import spurious drugs in the country originating from different sources and from different places in China," a health ministry note to the CBI had said.

Fake drugs getting into the country every year are estimated to be in the range of a whopping Rs 15,000 crore to Rs 17,500 crore, accounting for nearly 20 per cent of the size of the pharma industry which is about Rs 85,000 crore.

Very recently, Nigerian authorities had intercepted a consignment of fake drugs supposed to have been marketed from India. However, a probe showed that the medicines had been manufactured in China and imported through India.

Azad referred the case to CBI which has also been asked to go into its entire ramification and also nail the culprits.

The Drug Controller General (India) has recommended prosecution of these companies as the original manufacturers in all these cases have informed India that the consignment does not belong to them.