The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) has approved Rs 190 crore under the Xth Plan for shifting the Central Drugs Research Institute (CDRI) into a new campus with state-of-the-art facilities at Sitapur Road, Lucknow. The new look institute would be truly world class and would be perfectly operational within four years of the release of funds.

The CCEA observed that CDRI is currently functioning from Chattar Manzil Palace, a monument of historic importance that needs to be handed over to the government of Uttar Pradesh. Since the existing building was not built for a research laboratory, there were a lot of limitations for CDRI to turn truly global, the CCEA noted. "Despite several initiatives and approaches introduced from time to time to rejuvenate the existing structure it has not been possible to conform to Good Laboratory Practices (GLP) standards. Moreover, the building has shown signs of deterioration and has been declared unsafe by the duly constituted expert committee," it said.

The new look Institute will now have acceptable working environment and improved safety to personnel. It will provide qualified and specialised trained scientific manpower to pharma industry, and provide quality service in quantity for regulatory pharmacology/toxicology, pharmacokinetics and metabolic studies to pharma industry.

The CCEA said that the new facility has been envisaged with the vision to discover and develop new chemical entities in disease areas of national priority and life-style and ageing related disorders. The Research & Development laboratories in the new premises would conform to the current and emerging international standards. There would also be a flexible organisational structure comprising of only three major Divisions viz. Biological Sciences, Chemical Sciences and Pre-clinical Sciences in place. Leadership positions at all levels will be merit based with an in-build stringent mechanism for assessment and monitoring of projects.

The setting up of the Institute will enable utilisation of scientific expertise and core facilities developed over five decades. It will help in meeting challenges and emerging needs of new drug discovery research and development. It will result in development of new products/process in drugs and pharmaceuticals facilitating generation of world class technologies and foreign exchange earnings, CCEA has said.