Empowered by SC verdict, DCA nabs two drug distributors for selling counterfeit cholesterol medicines
The move is being hailed as the first of its kind in the state, as it is for the first time that DCA officials arrested the accused, produced them in court and secured judicial remand of two weeks in order to question them and gather more details about their racket.
The DCA inspectors conducted an extensive operations starting from seizure of drugs to medical tests, and arrests of the accused individuals and subsequent legal procedures such as legal paperwork, courtroom arguments and jail handover.
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The DCA's newfound authority comes from a 2020 Supreme Court order where it stated that the drug inspectors have the power to arrest individuals for offences under the Drugs and Cosmetics Act, particularly concerning spurious drugs, without a warrant. "Our action is now being seen as a precedent, with DCAs in other states also planning to make arrests in similar cases. The arrests were necessary as there is a risk of the accused tampering with the evidence.
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Our teams will travel to Delhi to investigate the source of these spurious drugs," another official said.
The counterfeit medicines, Rosuvas F20 and Rosuvas F10, were recently put on a list of spurious drugs by India's drug regulatory body, the Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation (CDSCO).
The arrested individuals, identified as Praveen Kumar Kanodia of Ganga Pharma Distributors and Mithinti Srinivas of Sri Nandini Pharma, were allegedly distributing spurious batches of Rosuvas F20 and Rosuvas F10.
The duo was subsequently remanded to 14 days of judicial custody.
The spurious drugs, which claimed to lower cholesterol levels, were reportedly falsely labelled as products of Sun Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd, a leading pharma brand.
"Distributing counterfeit or duplicate medicines is a cognisable offence, and arrests can be made in such cases with the court having to send the accused to remand. To check that the drug is spurious, we confirmed with the original manufacturer and even conducted our own tests.
We even explained the same to the magistrate in Nampally, and that is a serious matter of public health. Pharma companies lose billions due to these parallel counterfeit networks," said a DCA drug inspector.
Since the two arrests in late June in Hyderabad, DCA officials have arrested two more persons — one in Karimnagar and another in Hyderabad — in connection with an anti-epileptic drug, again fraudulently bearing Sun Pharma's label.
Shahnawaz Qasim, director general, DCA Telangana, said, "We have adopted a zero-tolerance policy and will not allow Telangana to become a hub of spurious drugs. We will be increasing our crackdown in the coming days. Administrative action will be taken against those accused, including suspension of licence."
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