The expert committee of the Food and Drugs Administration (FDA) in Maharashtra, which was set up on directives from the Mumbai high court to go into the reasons for the widespread prevalence of spurious drugs in the state, is learnt to have come to the conclusion that the prevalence of spurious drugs in the state is vastly due to the severe shortage of manpower at the drug inspectors level.

The 5-member expert committee of the FDA under Deputy Commissioner SA Momin has submitted its findings to the FDA Commissioner Dhanraj Kamatkar who in turn will soon submit the findings to the high court. The court will take up the matter on June 6.

However, the FDA officials did not divulge the details of the findings as the matter is sub judice.

With around 50 per cent of the total 161 posts of drug inspectors lying vacant for a long time, even the routine and mandatory inspection of around 50,000 drug selling units (chemist shops) in the state has become far and few between. Surprisingly, there has been no appointment of drug inspectors during the last 10 years, the last appointment being made way back in 1997.

Due to the acute shortage of staff, the mandatory inspections of these selling units have become a thing of the past, with no checks on the unscrupulous chemists who, in the absence of any inspections, resort to all kinds of illegal activities like selling expired drugs, substandard drugs and even spurious drugs. At present, the department acts only on specific complaints, sources said.

Earlier, acting on a writ petition filed by one Lakpatrai Mehta of Pune, the Mumbai high court had directed the state FDA Commissioner on January 27 this year to go into the reasons for the prevalence of spurious drugs in the market and submit a detailed report for the reasons. The petitioner had claimed that 30 per cent of the drugs in Maharashtra are spurious.

The commissioner set up a 5-member expert committee under SA Momin on February 7 this year. After several sittings, the expert committee submitted its findings to the Commissioner on March 5. After taking a final decision, the Commissioner will soon submit the final report to the high court.