Following a tip off from the intelligence wing, the officials of the Kerala drugs control department have busted a racket involving clandestine supply and sale of medicines operated between the border areas of Tamil Nadu and Kerala.

The investigating officials said some Chennai based marketing companies are behind the illegal trade and one company operating on Domellows Road in the city is under scanner.

The medicines were sold through some fancy stores in the interior villages near the border area of Marayimuttam in Neyyattinkara Taluk, close to the southernmost part of Kerala, said Hari Prasad, the drugs controller of Kerala.

The mafia was taking advantage of the situation prevailing in the area where no medical store was functioning and the medicines were being sold through some fancy stores, he added.

The seized products included Vikram Anticold tablets manufactured by Vikram Labs, Mussafar Nagar and Vovemac Plus, a combination of Diclofenac and Paracetamol used for pain. Vovemac was manufactured by Omega Biotech, Rurkey and was marketed by a Chennai based company, Macro Pharmaceuticals, Chennai, said the drugs controller.

The officials raided one Shivodaya Fancy Store and seized huge quantities of anti-cold and anti-inflammatory drugs from the store and produced before the Neyyatinkara CJM court, said Revi S Menon, deputy drugs controller who led the departmental operation in the area.

Despite repeated searches in the house of a local person who is supposed to be behind this illegal distribution and sale for the last several years, no stock of medicine was found from his home. The local person who operates this illegal trade is in active collaboration with some wholesale dealers in the southern districts of Tamil Nadu, said the deputy DC.

The officials have registered a case of violation of 18 C of the Drugs and Cosmetics (D&C) Act for unauthorized stock and sale of medicines against the fancy store.

Meanwhile, director of drugs control in Tamil Nadu, G Selvaraj said he will immediately initiate action after consultation with the Kerala DC. He has already alerted the drug inspectors in the border areas of Tamil Nadu in the south.

According to sources, the DC will shortly constitute a separate wing of inspectors to check and monitor the supply and distribution of medicines in the areas bordering Kerala.

This is the second time, the Kerala DCA is taking action on clandestine sale and illegal inflow of drugs from other states to Kerala in the last one year.

In April this year, the drug control officials had seized 20,000 bottles of a cough syrup worth Rs.25 lakh from the premises of a wholesale dealer in Kozhikodu. The syrup was manufactured by a company in Andhra Pradesh without obtaining licence to manufacture and sent to Kerala through some clandestine sources.

The drugs control department in Tamil Nadu is strictly implementing the provisions of D&C Act in the state following the unearthing of illegal trade practices including recycling of expired drugs carried out by certain pharmaceutical traders in Chennai two years ago.