As the border villages in the capital district of Kerala have become havens for illegal stocking and sale of medicines, the drugs control department has tightened enforcement activities throughout these villages bordering Tamil Nadu.
 
As part of the operation to bust illegal sale of medicines required for both humans and animals, the assistant drugs control office at Nadumangadu in Thiruvananthapuram district, following a tip off, raided a private hospital pharmacy and seized huge quantities of various categories of medicines stocked there. All the medicines were stocked in an unsafe condition, office sources said.
 
According to the ADC, P.K Sreekumar, St.Vincent Mission Hospital functioning at Chullimanoor run by a Tamil Nadu native homoeo doctor has been treating patients in allopathic system with separate pharmacy for allopathic medicines. He said the hospital pharmacy had no licence and no pharmacist was working there. Since the doctor is a homeopath, he is not authorised to keep allopathic drugs at his clinic, hence cases under section, 18 C and 18 A (6) were taken against the doctor and the pharmacy. The seized drugs were produced before the Judicial First Class Magistrate Court at Nedumangad.
 
The pharmacy at the hospital was selling medicines to all those who wanted drugs without prescription of a registered medical practitioner. The investigators could not find any purchase records of the medicines. According to the enforcement officials, the department is enquiring the source of the medicines. With no registered pharmacist to dispense the medicines, the officials said the hospital was violating many provisions of the D&C Act and Rules.
 
“On the ground that the medicines were stocked in an unauthorised location without valid drug licence, a case of violation of Section 18(c) of the Drugs and Cosmetics Act, 1940 was taken against the accused homoeopath, Sathyaraj. Further, case of violation of 18 A(6) was registered since the accused was found as quack and the drugs were sold without valid prescription. No purchase records were kept at the pharmacy. Medicines worth Rs.50,000 were seized from the pharmacy and it was sealed”, said Sreekumar.
 
In addition to the ADC, the raided team included drugs inspectors Santhosh K. Mathew, V. Vinod, Aji. S and V.N. Smitha.