With the recent suspension of V A Jawdekar, assistant commissioner of Babulnath area, Mumbai for neglecting his duty, the Maharashtra Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has embarked on a surprise inspection drive of all chemist shops across the state.  The main objective of this drive is to make every pharmacist to be present at their shops.

Maharashtra state has more than 1.5 lakh registered pharmacists but recent investigations carried out by State FDA found that there were no pharmacists in 25,000 of the 60,000 shops in the state.

Kamlesh Shende, joint commissioner (drugs), FDA Maharashtra said that as per Drugs and Cosmetics Act, 1940 a pharmacist should be present while dispensing medicines over-the-counter to the patients while the D&C Act provisions state that pharmacists should verify prescriptions and should issue bills. He further informed, “As per our process if any chemists store is found without pharmacist, strict action will be taken against them as per  the act and FDA cane even cancel their licenses on the spot.”

Mahesh Zhagde, FDA commissioner said that it is important to strengthen the organisation for public safety and maintaining quality of drugs.  He further stressed, “A pharmacist is important for dispensing of medicines and also can act as a counsellor to a patient. As per the D&C Act, it is mandatory to have presence of a pharmacist in the chemist shop all the time, but somehow this is not being strictly followed. For this we have planned vigorous steps to ensure proper implementation of the law so that chemists shop will have registered pharmacists.”

Earlier, the FDA had asked its Drug Inspectors to reach out to the masses to help patients to buy right medicines with doctors' prescription and to verify pharmacists presence at the shop. FDA also wants patients to recheck issued bills whether the bills have been issued by a pharmacist and most importantly the bills have been signed by him.

Furthermore, FDA wants medical fraternity and various other departments to come together to conduct mass awareness programmes amongst people of not only rural but even from urban areas to make them aware that they should buy medicines with pharmacists' presence and with proper doctors' prescription and not to buy medicines on their own.