The officials of the Drug Control Administration raided an unlicensed pharmaceutical company, Magven Pharma, at Cherlapally, near Hyderabad. The company was manufacturing sildenafil citrate tablets, pack and was selling them as Viagra of Pfizer. Huge stocks of tablets were seized from the unit along with bethanechol chloride tablets, an energy drug which had labels of a German pharmaceutical company, Glenwood GMBH. The officials also seized stocks from medical shops and distributors' godowns in the city and elsewhere in the state. The total seizures were valued at Rs 1crore, the biggest in recent times.
According to P Ananthasayanam Reddy, Additional Director-General, Drugs and Copyright, the raids on medical shops were still continuing to seize the remaining stocks, if any, on the shops counters. The "medicines" were sold in the market claiming that they would improve potency and virility of men.
Reddy said the raid at the premises of Magven Pharma, which had no valid licences since January this year, resulted in the seizure of drugs and incriminating articles worth Rs 50 lakh. The seized Sildenafil Citrate 100mg tablets were blister-packed with labels of Pfizer, giving the impression that the drug was an imported one.
The Drug Control inspectors led by B Soubhagya Laxmi also seized three lakh Ayurvedic capsules which had no labels but suspected to contain sildenafil citrate, apart from 70 kg of yellow and rose coloured tablets without labels. The major haul of drugs at the unit included 2,200 Acezox Forte tablets, 11,000 capsules of D Mox and unused foils belonging to BJR Pharma and Click Pharma of Hyderabad.
According to Dr D Hanumantha Rao, Director, Drug Control Administration, the seized tablets were being analysed in his laboratory. The manufacture and sale of these tablets without licence constitute violation of the Drugs and Cosmetic Act, 1940, and would attract prosecution, he said.
Though the licence of Magven Pharma expired on December 31, 2001, the company did not apply for its renewal but continued to manufacture the drug, sildenafil citrate, a new drug approved by the Drug Controller-General of India for 'erectile dysfunction'.
The drugs seized from shops in the city and Vijayawada included Ozomen capsules and Ozomen Forte capsules which were manufactured by the Fizikem Laboratories and Ayurvedic capsules for treating sexual disorders, and Shila Shakti Forte capsules, K K Forte capsules and Shilajit capsules.
The series of raids also had the officials freezing Ayurvedic capsules worth Rs 4 lakh at Narasaraopet and capsules worth Rs 1.5 lakh at Eluru and Visakhapatnam.