The Bureau of Pharma Public Sector Undertakings of India (BPPI), which is managing the Jan Aushadhi programme, has shortlisted 43 private companies in the preliminary round for supplying the generic drugs after it invited and opened the tenders.

“The technical bids had been scrutinized and the visits to the factories of the selected companies were in progress to assess the parameters and finalise the list of suppliers. We hope to complete the process in another one week time,” according to a senior official of BPPI. He also disclosed that most of the companies shortlisted are mid-sized, though big pharma manufacturers also are in the list.

After toying with the idea of sourcing drugs from the private sector for several years, the agency had floated the tenders for procurement of drugs and medicines on September 11 and opened the technical bids on November 6. The agency officials, after scrutinizing the bids, have since then launched the official visits to the sites of the bidders.

Though small scale manufacturers were looking keenly towards this policy decision, finally it did not do any good to them as the Government fixed minimum annual turnover of Rs. 10 crore for three years as one of the qualification criteria to supply the drugs.

The tender had also given a list of 361 drugs, including vaccines and surgicals, to be procured from the private sector, thus expanding the bracket of drugs in line with the new business plan that was implemented recently to give a fillip to the lacklustre programme.

“Tenderer shall be a manufacturer having valid own manufacturing unit duly licensed by licensing authorities or direct importer holding valid import license. Distributors/Suppliers/Agents/Loan licensees are not eligible to participate in the Tenders,” said the tender notice. “Average Annual turnover in the last three years i.e. 2010-2011, 2011-2012 and 2012-2013 shall not be less than Rs. 10 crore and turnover for the year 2012-2013 should also be not less than Rs. 10 crore,” the notice said.

The proposal for purchasing drugs from the private sector was expected to happen immediately after the launch of the programme in November, 2008. In fact, the Department of Pharmaceuticals (DoP) had invited expression of interest from the companies in December 2008 and as many as 76 firms including some major companies had responded to it. But later the DoP developed cold feet and finally dropped the idea of sourcing medicines from private companies on the plea that the expressions of interest were found to be not meeting all requisite criteria.