The Drugs Technical Advisory Board (DTAB) has approved the proposed reconstitution of a sub-committee on homoeopathic medicines to deliberate technical matters, but asked the Department of Ayush to include a couple of State Drug Controllers also in the panel.

The DTAB agreed to the constitution of the said sub-committee on homoeopathic medicines as suggested by the Department. “It however recommended that one or two State Drugs Controllers having experience in enforcing the provisions of the Drugs & Cosmetics (D&C) Rules relating to homoeopathic medicines may also be inducted in the committee for providing inputs in respect of implementation of the provisions of the D&C Rules, 1945 for homoeopathic medicines in the States. It was further recommended that the tenure of the committee shall be of two years,” according to the official sources.

The DTAB had earlier constituted a sub-committee on homoeopathic medicines to deliberate technical matters relating to homoeopathic medicines and give its recommendations to the DTAB for its consideration. The proposal for reconstitution of this sub-committee was earlier considered by the DTAB in its 59th meeting held on June 24, 2011.

The members then desired that the sub-committee should be more broad based having experts from diverse fields related to homoeopathy for indepth deliberations. Accordingly the Department has now forwarded the names of the members to be in the panel and the DTAB has given its nod.

Director General, Central Council for Research in Homoeopathy, will be the chairman of the sub-committee while  deputy advisor or joint advisor for homoeopathy will be the member secretary. Director, Homoeopathic Pharmacopoeia Laboratory, Ghaziabad, and deputy secretary, or above level officer of Department of Ayush will be the official members.

The sub-committee will have eight non-official members. Drug analyst from Maharashtra Drug Testing Laboratory, Dr Indira Balachandran (Centre for Medicinal Plants Research, Arya Vaidyasala, Kottakal (Kerala), Vijay Kumar Kapoor (Dean, Faculty of Pharmacy and Allied, Punjab Technical University, Jalandhar) representative of Homoeopathy Pharmacopoeia Committee, managing director of the Kerala State Co-Operative Homoeopathic Pharmacy, Kerala, chairman of Association of Homoeopathy Drug Manufacturers, head of Department of Materia Madica, National Institute of Homoeopathy, Kolkata, and  Dr V K Gupta (a homoeopathy practitioner) will be the members.