National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) has sought explanation from the pharmaceutical companies who have failed to comply with the Supreme Court directive of depositing half the amount they had overcharged on seven price-controlled bulk drugs within a month. Even though the deadline ended on October 2, 2003, none of the companies, other than Ranbaxy complied with the SC directive.

The SC verdict on the civil appeal no 3375-3384/2002 filed by the Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilizers had asked NPPA to recover 50 per cent of the over charged amounts from the companies involved. The companies who received the NPPA notices in this regard were Cipla Ltd, Ranbaxy Laboratories, Okasa Pharma Ltd, Unichem Laboratories and USV Ltd.

The drugs on which the companies overcharged the public include Ciprofloxacin, Norfloxacin, Doxycycline, Salbutamol, Theophylline, Cloxacillin and Glipizide.

According to NPPA sources, none of the companies have responded to their communication. The authority is yet to decide its future course of action. A high level committee in the Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilizers is likely to recommend the next move in a week, it is learnt.

Meanwhile, Cipla, which was asked to pay about Rs 50 crore as part payment, has approached the Allahabad High Court, challenging the validity of some of the NPPA's price notifications that relates to these drugs. Though there are dozens of companies who were engaged in overpricing these drugs, NPPA is yet to serve notices to them. Officials said that their attempt is to send notices to the parties involved and then take up other cases later. The calculation of the overcharged amount in individual cases is time consuming and may take months together.