Even as the Good Laboratory Practices (GLP) comes into force on November 1 this year in the country making it mandatory for all pharma units to upgrade their laboratories as per the GLP norms, the Department of Pharmaceuticals (DoP) has decided to extend the Credit Linked Capital Subsidy Scheme (CLCSS) for the GLP.  The CLCSS scheme was originally launched by the DoP for Schedule M implementation, but the scheme could not find favour with the industry due to several lacunae in the scheme.

According to sources, the DoP has in-principle decided to extend the jinxed CLCSS scheme for the upgradation of laboratories as per the GLP norms set by the union health ministry.   A decision to extend to the CLCSS scheme to the GLP was taken by the DoP at a meeting between the industry and the senior DoP officials held on October 22.   However, the nitty-gritties of the scheme being utilised for the GLP is being worked out.

Earlier, the industry has been demanding to the DoP to extend the CLCSS scheme to the GLP, as the DoP was seriously contemplating to roll back this much publicised CLCSS scheme due to the extremely poor response from the industry. Apart from asking the DoP to continue the financial support to the small pharma units by continuing the CLCSS scheme for the technical upgradation of their units under Schedule M, the industry had also asked the DoP that the upgrading required under the Schedule L-1 for GLP should also be included in the CLCSS scheme as the small industries are in dire need of financial support from the government for upgrading their units as per the GLP norms set by the union health ministry.

The extension of the CLCSS scheme to the GLP will be a big help to the small pharma units in the country, as the small players are not in a financial position to comply the GLP norms set by the government on their own. 

The DoP had introduced the tweaked CLCSS scheme in the country last year to financially assist the SSI units to upgrade their units as per GMP norms. After tweaking the CLCSS scheme to make it industry-friendly as per the direction of the planning commission, the DoP was engaged in aggressive marketing of the scheme. The top officials of the DoP and the Ministry of Micro, Small &Medium Enterprises (MSME) have been touring different parts of the country to popularize the scheme.  The DoP held several  workshops  in different parts of the country where there are concentration of pharma SSI units to popularize the scheme.