Flouting Drug Price Control Order and overcharging controlled drugs by misinterpreting DPCO provisions has become a standard practice for the pharmaceutical companies ever since the practice of regulating essential drugs started by the government. It has been found that violation of DPCO is more resorted to by large and medium scale companies and not the small scale units. National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority, the Central body fixing and monitoring drug prices in the country, has been doing its best to check the breaching or circumventing of DPCO all these years. But the cases of price violation have been only increasing over the years. In the year ended March 31, 2014 alone, NPPA detected 89 cases of overcharging by pharma companies and it is possible that there could be many more undetected cases of price violation during last year. With this the total number of drug price violation cases in the country stands at 1018 for an overcharged amount of Rs.3381. 91 crore. As these cases are fought in different courts and are in various stages of hearing, it is difficult to assume when such a huge amount will be recovered by the government.
The basic problem with the NPPA is that it is a Central body and it cannot effectively monitor drug prices considering the size of the country and existing judicial practices. It is well known that courts take several years to pass an order even in a simple case of price violation. As of now, NPPA does not have its own monitoring machinery in the states to detect cases as soon as a violation takes place. Therefore, the Department of Pharmaceuticals has to either set up dedicated state level monitoring cells with adequate staff or take the support of state drug control department. The support of state drug control administration will be critical for detection and follow up action against the offenders. It is laudable in this context what Maharashtra FDA did in the case of overcharging of Crocin Advance. The state FDA officials very effectively stopped GSK overcharging Crocin Advance, made the company to withdraw the illegally priced stocks from all over the country and supply fresh stocks at NPPA fixed price. The company was even made to pay the overcharged amount Rs. 47.87 crore to NPPA last month. If Maharashtra FDA officials can do this, other state drug control authorities should also initiate such actions to support NPPA and in the interest of patient community. For effective implementation of DPCO and other Central laws, active participation of state drug control authorities is extremely necessary.