Even as the Sharad Pawar-led Group of Ministers (GoM) constituted by Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh is gearing up for its first meeting to thrash out the vexed issue of drug price control, some of the top pharmaceutical companies are found to be charging very high prices for some of the essential drugs when the same drugs are available at much lower prices from equally reputed companies.

The price difference for some of these branded drugs is ranging from 100 to more than 1000 per cent with hardly any difference in their therapeutic value and efficacy. And usually the most expensive brands are being prescribed by the physicians and stocked by chemists at the instance of pharma companies.

Thanks to the government's lackadaisical attitude towards control on prices of essential drugs for the last more than 12 years since it last imposed on 74 drugs, the gargantuan drug market in the country is abundant with such cases of same drugs of different brands with huge price variations, like any other commodity such as apparel, electronics, etc.

While the rapacious big pharma companies exploit the Indian syche of expensive means better quality, the billion-dollar question that haunts the gullible drug consumers in this country is, whether these expensive products are really better than the other cheaper medicines available in the market.

"How can there be difference in quality when all these companies get their drugs from the same bulk drug producers?" asks a highly respected medical expert from Delhi. "The quality of the same products of various brands is exactly the same. The quality cannot be different, as all the companies get drugs from the same bulk drug manufacturers. Only formulations are different", he said.

While Union Chemicals and Fertilisers Minister Ramvilas Paswan, known for his populist measures, is ploughing a lonely furrow against his own ministerial colleagues for imposing price control on more drugs (around 360) in the interest of the common man, the pharma industry is said to be putting pressure on the government to stop it on the plea that the industry will suffer huge losses if the price control is imposed on more drugs. That some major pharma companies are posting a profit growth of more than 100 per cent during the last one year is conveniently forgotten by the protagonists of this argument.

Apart from the pharma industry's self-aggrandizing designs, there is another nexus involving the doctors and the chemists working in the field, much against the interest of the drug consumers. Though cheaper medicines of the same strength made by other companies are available in the market, the doctors usually prescribe the costly medicines as they are provided highly attractive financial incentives. For the chemists, the reason is not far to find as they earn more commission from the big companies.

The exploitation of the unsuspecting drug consumers, who have no other choice but to religiously follow the doctors' prescription, is so high that the price variation in several cases is unimaginable. Though there are instances galore, some cases are very glaring.

For instance, the cost of Risperidone 2mg made by Torrent costs Rs 16.94 for 10 tablets, the same medicine of Ethnor is available in the market for Rs 270, a whopping difference of more than 1500 per cent. Likewise, when a strip of 10 tablet of Levofloxacin 500mg made by Centaur costs Rs 34, the same drug marketed by Aventis costs a whopping Rs 950. While a strip of 10 tablets of Ciprofloxacin 500mg of FDC is available for just Rs 39, the Ranbaxy sells the same product at Rs 89.60. Likewise, Glimepiride 1mg made by Zydus Cadila costs Rs 9.87, Aventis charges Rs 55.76 for the same drug.

Another example is the price of clarithromycin for a strip of 4 tablets made by Pfizer is Rs 148, while the same drug made by Cipla is Rs 100 and the one made by Lyka is just Rs 74. The price of Simvastatin, the drug used to control cholesterol is yet another example. While the brand marketed by Ranbaxy is priced at Rs 90 for 10 tablets, the same drug with same strength made by Themis is available for just Rs 35, that too for a strip of 15 tablets.