The Confederation of Indian Pharmaceutical Industry (CIPI), the umbrella organisation of small-scale drug manufacturers in the country, has initiated a campaign among the Government institutions and Public Sector Undertakings (PSU) to ensure majority of their drug purchases are from the small-scale pharmaceutical units.

CIPI's campaign mainly revolves around sensitisation of the authorities of these organisations on not mandating the turnover criteria in their tender purchases, as followed by most of these organisations in the recent years. CIPI leaders have identified about ten large institutions and public undertakings, which prefers turnover criteria for drug procurement at present. This includes the Directorate General of Quality Assurance (DGQA), Bharath Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL), Neyveli Lignite Corporation Ltd. (NLC), Tamil Nadu Medical Services Corporation (TNMSC), Tata Steel etc. Further, the state level pharma associations under the CIPI fold are also in the process of identifying such Government institutions in their respective states.

The association has started sending letters to the authorities of these institutions clarifying the need to include SSIs in their drug procurement plans, underlying the role played by SSI pharma units in providing quality healthcare to the poor and needy in the country at affordable prices. Further, the CIPI leaders are also planning business meetings with the authorities of these institutions to find a case to case solution to ensure the SSIs get adequate business orders without the constraints of turnover criteria.

T S Jaishankar said, many of these institutions started mandating turnover criteria in their tender conditions only from the last few years. Prior to this, majority of their supply needs were met by the SSIs. CIPI is forced to launch the campaign considering the trend of more and more institutions and PSUs including the turnover condition in their tender process.

"The Government and institution related drug supply in India has a size of more than Rs.15,000 crore where the small scale manufacturers have about 70 per cent of the market share at present. Considering the present trend, the role of small players may be restricted to a maximum of 30 per cent business soon," said Jaishankar.

As per the tender conditions of DGQA, a company should have minimum turnover of Rs 20 crore to participate in the tender process. Many of the State Governments are also mandating a turnover of Rs 5 crore for participating in the tender process. This clause has caused elimination of most of the SSIs from even applying for the tender process, resulting in the business restricted only for multinationals and large Indian companies.

CIPI had demanded the Central Health and Family Welfare Ministry to resolve this issue, but so far the ministry has not responded favourably. CIPI demands that GMP certification should be considered as the criteria for minimum eligibility for participating in the tenders, instead of the turnover criteria. CIPI also had sought a uniform policy for the entire country for procurement of medicines by the central and state governments, hospitals and public sector organizations, said Jaishankar.