The drug regulatory officials in Tamil Nadu are struggling hard to execute effective measures to conduct proper inspections at the premises of all the drugs traders and manufacturing companies due to large size of the zonal jurisdictions, it is learnt.
According to sources, the large area size and the increasing number of licencees often become a major hurdle for efficient enforcement, and the situation requires an enhanced support from the state government to establish a strong drug control system in the state.
The present zonal set-up of the DCA helps the drug traders and manufacturers escape from the control of the regulators, sources said.
Bifurcation of zones and appointment of more officials could be the only solution to help the situation. This is the view of the regulators, manufacturers, traders and representatives of health associations. Therefore the zones must be created either on the basis of population or size of area or number of licencees.
At present there are 14 zones. The Chennai district is divided into four zones because of its population size and number of licencees.
Other zones are Kancheepuram, Thiruvallur, Madurai, Tirunelveli, Vellore, Salem, Coimbatore, Trichy, Tanjore and Virudunagar. Several of these zones have been set up by clubbing together more number of districts, and in such big zones no effective monitoring is carried out and no prosecution is carried out against any violator. The reason is not the inefficiency of the department officials, but the unscientific and impractical set up of the administrative wing.
When the revenue districts of Thiruvallur and Kancheepuram have separate zones, Trichy, Coimbatore and Salem zones have been made up of several big districts. Trichy zone consists of six districts; Trichy, Karoor, Perambalur, Ariyalur, Vizhuppuram and Kadalur. One assistant director of drugs control (ADC) is in charge of this big area when the districts are under six district collectors. Compared to other zones of the state, the districts come under this zone have more number of licencees than anywhere in the state. The population and the area size of these districts are also bigger.
Thirunelveli zone comprises, apart from that district, Tuticorin and Kanyakumari districts. Virudunagar zone includes Virudunagar, Ramanathapuram and Sivaganga districts.
Madurai zone has been created by clubbing together three districts - Madurai, Theni and Dindukkal. Madurai is a big corporation and the number of licencees and population is also big, hence it needs a separate zone. The same situation prevails in Coimbatore which, in area wise and population wise, is bigger and needs an independent zone. Currently it consists of Coimbatore, Nilgiris, Erodu and Tirupur districts which are all bigger ones.
Likewise big districts like Puthukottai and Tanjore are joined together with Thiruvaroor and Nagapattinam districts to frame the Tanjore zone.
Salem, Namakkal, Krishnagiri and Dharmapuri districts are clustered to create Salem zone which also needs bifurcation. Vellore and Thiruvannamalai district form the Vellore zone.
According to official sources, the drugs control department has given a proposal to the government for bifurcation of the zones and establishment of more zonal offices. For an average level of monitoring, a minimum of 25 zonal offices and ADCs are required in the whole of Tamil Nadu where more than 42000 retail shops, 7000 wholesalers, 450 manufacturing units, 400 blood banks and more than 200 cosmetics manufacturing units are operating.