Bengal govt advisory to pharmacists in wake of seizures of spurious drugs

 In the wake of the recent seizures of huge quantities of spurious drugs in Howrah, North 24-Parganas and Kolkata

SNS | Kolkata | May 25, 2025 : In the wake of the recent seizures of huge quantities of spurious drugs in Howrah, North 24-Parganas and Kolkata, the West Bengal Directorate of Drug Control (WBDDC) under the state health department on 23 May issued an advisory for drug wholesalers and retailers regarding purchase of medicines from authentic sources traceable to original manufacturers.

The six points of the advisory are given below:

1. Wholesalers must ascertain that the medicines they are purchasing are bought through proper channels of distribution, starting from the chartered financial analyst of the original company.

2. Wholesalers must check the validity of the licences of the sellers through the online licence portal available for most states while purchasing medicines and submit the same to the West Bengal drug control department for verification of outside state distributors.

3. While making payments to wholesalers located outside the state, wholesalers should check that the bank account details are necessarily in the name of the licensed firm concerned.

4. Wholesalers must mandatorily check the GST number and confirm that the firm is taking the GST credit.

5. All wholesalers must mandatorily check the QR codes of the 300 drugs, included in Schedule H-2. (Rules mandate that manufacturers of 300 specified drug formulations, listed in Schedule H-2, print or affix a barcode or QR code on the label.)

6. All retailers must mandatorily check the QR codes of the 300 drugs included in Schedule H-2 before purchasing from the wholesalers.

In April, the Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation (CDSCO) had conducted a nationwide sample test of various medicines and found that 196 medicines failed in terms of their quality.

Recent raids by the WBDDC have uncovered large quantities of fake and substandard drugs from Titagarh and various locations in North 24-Parganas and Malda.

The WBDDC officials felt that some of these spurious medicines rackets originated from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh.