With the next Indian Pharmaceutical Congress (IPC) scheduled to be held in the national capital under the aegis of Indian Pharmacy Graduates Association (IPGA), the host organization will meet here on January 23, to set the ball rolling for the event by constituting the local organizing committee.

The IPG is planning to hold the 60th IPC in the second week of December 2008, preferably from Friday to Sunday. There was also suggestion for organizing the event in the first week of December. However, the dates for the mega event will soon be fixed in the meeting scheduled this month. Besides the venue, the theme of the conference also will be announced at the scheduled meeting, IPGA leader A K Nasa told Pharmabiz.

It was announced in the last IPC held at Varanasi from December 20-23 that the prestigious pharma event will be held in Delhi under the banner of the IPGA, a member of the Indian Pharmaceutical Congress Association. DCGI Dr M Venketeshwarlu has been named as the president of the IPCA already.

``We are already in the process of finalizing the venues for the event. Hopefully, we will have a clear idea of everything in the first meeting itself. We are expecting 10,000 delegates this year, as all those from the industry and the academic circles are keen to come to Delhi,'' Nasa said.

The IPC at Varanasi, hosted by the Department of Pharmaceuticals of the Banaras Hindu University saw around 5000 delegates. Going by the expected number of delegates, the Delhi event is going to create a record of sorts. Hence, the IPGA is looking for elaborate arrangements to outshine the past events.

Indian Pharmaceutical Congress Association (IPCA) is the apex body representing Indian pharmacists working in various capacities, viz. community pharmacists, hospitals pharmacists, in industry (in production, R&D, quality control, quality assurance and marketing), regulatory officials, academicians and other disciplines and areas of work.

Having over 20,000 pharmacists as its members, it has five constituents - the Indian Pharmaceutical Association, the Indian Pharmacy Graduates Association, the Indian Hospital Pharmacists' Association, the Association of Pharmaceutical Teachers of India and the All India Drugs Control Officer's Confederation. The first IPC was held in Kolkota in 1948. The Varanasi IPC has the theme of `Pharma Vision 2020 - product, patient, practice.'