The Kerala High Court extended the stay upto March 24 on the decision of the state drug controller to withdraw the restrictions related to distance factor on sanctioning new medical shops.

The state drug controller had withdrawn the restrictions during the second week of December 2004, following a directive from the state health minister K K Ramachandran. Kerala is the first state in the country to impose distance factor in restricting mushrooming of medical shops.

Kerala High Court's single bench of Justice Joseph allowed a stay on this move, while allowing a joint petition filed by A Vinod, of New Sakthi Medicals, Chellakkara and the All Kerala Chemists and Druggists Association (AKCDA). The court accepted the petition and awarded an interim stay for two weeks initially, and notices were served to the government departments concerned to respond within the timeframe.

When the court again took up the case last week, the stay was extended up to 24th March, allowing more time for the respondents to file their affidavits.

Meanwhile, the state health department served a show-cause notice to the former Drug Controller T P Gopinathan on the issue, for submitting an affidavit in the court with points allegedly detrimental to the interests of the government, says sources. While the DC justified his decision to withdraw the rules, he also highlighted the advantages of enforcing the distance factor in the affidavit.

Government counsels informed the health department that these points could weaken the stand of the government. Following this, the health department authorities served a show-cause notice to the DC, just an hour before his retirement on February 28 2005. However, he did not respond to the notice, said informed sources.

As reported in Pharmabiz earlier, in an order issued in December 2002, the Kerala drug control department decided not to allow any new retail outlets within a vicinity of at least 100 metres away from the existing chemist shops in the case of rural area and 50 metres in urban area. Further, the circular mandated to have a minimum area of 15 sq.metres for retail outlets and 20 sq.metre space for wholesale outlets, instead of the 10 sq.metres provision prescribed in the Drugs & Cosmetics Act, 1940. This was introduced with a view to regulate proliferation of medical outlets and unethical drug trade, and due to complaints from traders on unethical competition from nearby medical stores. The DC enforced these provisions as per the powers conferred on him as per Rules 64 (1) and (2) of the Drugs & Cosmetics Act, 1940.

However, both the provisions were withdrawn as per a circular dated December 9, 2004, following a directive from the state health minister K K Ramachandran. The minister said many MLAs were demanding to scrap these provisions for sometime as many people were complaining the clauses caused difficulties in approving new medical shops. Further, the restrictions would deny numerous jobless people in the state an opportunity to start medical shops for living, the minister had reasoned, earlier.