The Drug Controller of Delhi has written to the Gujarat Food and Drug Control Administration (FDCA) that there exists no pharma stockist by the name Shakti Traders which has been detected as a firm supplying spurious drugs, as part of an inter-state spurious drug racket.
This is subsequent to Gujarat FDCA detecting 8 such products worth Rs.51 lakhs giving negative results on lab testing recently in Ahmedabad. The seized products claimed to be antibiotics were also sold at exorbitant prices of over Rs.200 for each strip of 10 tablets.
Based on the investigations from respective state drug controllers where the menace of spurious drugs have spread, the clandestine activity involved supplying these products through a Delhi based trader which used to raise invoice from a drug wholesaler operating from elsewhere.
Gujarat FDCA Commissioner Dr H G Koshia explains, “An interstate spurious drug racket of this magnitude has been detected for the first time in Gujarat and the state regulator is in constant touch with drug controllers of other states on the matter.”
As part of the operation, 50 drug retail stores in Ahmedabad were also supplied fake/spurious drugs by the drug dealer and two people have been nabbed by the FDA and police in this connection. Practicing doctors were found prescribing spurious antibiotics kept in these retail drug stores.
Gujarat FDCA is planning to investigate circulation of spurious drugs marketed under the names of fictitious companies as part of its ongoing crackdown on spurious drugs in the wake of latest findings by other state drug controllers where the network of unscrupulous drug dealers have currently spanned including states like Maharashtra, Delhi, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Gujarat.
Maharashtra Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is also investigating the matter further to their correspondence with Gujarat FDCA on the inter-state spurious drug racket in the backdrop of detection of spurious drugs recently through some exporting firms.
Maharashtra FDA has also got reports of mislabeling of drugs which in the first place makes it spurious considering the fact that certain drug exporting firms have come under the scanner based on the department’s intelligence reports.
Madhya Pradesh state drug regulator informed that the products were supplied through a Delhi based trader with invoice being raised by a drug wholesaler in Gwalior. Vadodara based drug testing lab in its test report concluded that antibiotics were grossly spurious with no active ingredients.
Based on the latest intelligence reports, spurious drugs used to be supplied in a clandestine manner through certain areas in Gujarat including Ahmedabad.