The sluggish campaign by the Department of Pharmaceuticals (DoP) to make available affordable drugs by opening Jan Aushadhi generic stores network may get a Rs.200 crore boost during the next five years.

Based on the revised business plan submitted by the DoP to infuse life into the pet scheme, a Steering Committee of the Planning Commission has recommended to allocate Rs.200 crore to further strengthen the scheme.

The revised plan aims at further widening and deepening the Jan Aushadhi reach both in terms of geography and therapeutic coverage. It is envisaged that for covering the whole country at an effective level, about Rs.200 crores would be required in the 12th Plan, according to the recommendation by the Steering Committee.

In the first phase of the Revised Business Plan (RBP), DoP proposes to focus on 11 States for opening of Jan Aushadhi Stores where the scheme has shown some success, namely Punjab, Haryana, Uttrakhand, Odisha, Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal, Jammu & Kashmir, Union Territories of Chandigarh and Delhi.

There are a total of 204 districts in these 11 States and it is proposed to open at least 3 Jan Aushadhi Stores (JAS) in each district of these States. Thus, a total of 612 JAS are proposed to be opened in the first phase to be accomplished in two years time. Ultimately, scheme is proposed to be extended to open at least five stores in every District/Sub-division of all the States including Karnataka and UTs, i.e., a total of 3150 stores all over the country, according to the plan.

As per the DoP list, so far 112 generic stores have been opened and Punjab leads the list with 53 outlets. When the scheme was launched in 2008, the ambitious target was to set up stores in all the districts of the country within five years. However, it made a sluggish progress so far, prompting the DoP to rework the strategy and forward a revised business plan to the Planning Commission.