The Tamil Nadu branch of the Indian Pharmacists Association (IPA), an organisation of pharmacy professionals in public and private sectors, has once again demanded to the state government for sanction of appointment of pharmacy inspectors in the state, which is the only one state in the south without regulators for enforcing Pharmacy Act.

The association has assigned its Chennai and Madurai zonal offices for mobilizing support from the registered pharmacists in order to prepare a memorandum to be submitted to the chief minister, sources from the zonal committees told Pharmabiz.

According to sources, it is the duty of the state pharmacy council to convince the government for sanction of pharmacy inspectors' posts, but the Tamil Nadu Pharmacy Council is showing a lethargic attitude in this respect.

A Rajaram, the district president of IPA in Madurai, who has been advocating for the cause for several years and even approached the Madras High Court earlier, while speaking to Pharmabiz, said the present administration of the Tamil Nadu Pharmacy Council is not proactive for realizing the purpose. He said the Registrar of the Council is not responding to the letters or memorandums sent to the Council office by associations of pharmacists.

When contacted, Dr T Elango, the Registrar, said he has no idea about such a demand and no information about court cases demanding the same purpose.

S. Senthil Kumar, the zonal secretary of IPA Chennai district committee said their association will make a further demand that all retail pharmacies in Tamil Nadu should have qualified pharmacists to dispense the drugs. He said ten percent of the total pharmacies do not have qualified pharmacists and the medicines are dispensed in most of the pharmacies by unqualified persons. The state has the strength of 45,000 retail pharmacies.

In Tamil Nadu, the pharmacy act 1948 was implemented on April 15, 1950 through a government order dated April 5, 1950 and published in the government gazette dated April 11, 1950. Under section 19 of the Act, the government had constituted the state pharmacy council on September 15, 1954. But, so far the Council could not appoint even a single pharmacy inspector despite repeated representations to the government.

The Council completed a period of 60 years on September 15 this year, but no programme was conducted to mark its launching memory.

In the neighbouring states of Kerala and Karnataka, respective Councils have appointed pharmacy inspectors in all the districts and the governments have notified their appointments.