Solan: Federation of Pharma Entrepreneurs (FOPE) and Himachal Drug Manufacturers Association (HDMA) are jointly organising one day Pharmaceutical Convention on May 28th , 2010 at Victoria Continental Inn, Subathu Road, Dharampur ,Solan , Himachal Pradesh. Indian Drug Manufacturers Association (IDMA) and Confederation of Indian Pharma Industries (CIPI) will also participate in the convention.
A spokesperson of the Convention said that Chief Minister of Himachal Pradesh, Prof. Prem Kumar Dhumal will be the Chief Guest on the occasion and State Health and Ayurveda minister, Dr Rajeev Bindal will preside over the function. Dr S.M.Jharwal,Chairman , NPPA and Dr Surinder Singh, DCGI besides, Mr Sushil Solanki, Commissioner Central Excise and Mr Navneet Marwah, Drug Controller, Himachal Pradesh will also participate in the convention.
Pharmaceutical unit owners will have an open house discussion with Prof. Prem Kumar Dhumal and others and will raise various trade related issues i.e. charging of exhorbitant freight by the local transport unions, anti industry and outrageous attitude of labour unions and erratic power supply , spurious Drug Act ,NPPA related issues and post Sunset Clause Era.
A 2007 notification ( which was later extended till March 2010) about formulation will also be debated during the convention. The notification prohibits pharma units in the special package area from manufacturing products other than approved before March 2010. In other words any new formulation after March 31,2010 will not be entitled for Excise and other holidays.
“But the central excise department gave a clarification on July 31, 2006 that the central excise exemption after the sunset of the package ( March 31,2010) will be available to the units only on the formulations which they were manufacturing before March 31,2010. Although they are licensed to manufacture Tablets, Capsule or syrup yet if they make a new formulation or a dosage form, Central Excise will be levied on them which is not justified,” B.R.Sikri, Co-Chairman, Federation of Pharma Entrepreneurs (FOPE) said.
Drug manufacturers will also debate flaws of Spurious Drug Act which if enforced will only add to the woes of drug manufacturers.
“Now the Spurious drugs Act has been introduced by the government which is as stringent as Narcotics Act and even the licensed manufacturers are treated like drug peddlers whereas the spurious drugs are manufactured by unlicensed manufacturers only . Licensed manufacturers registered with drug control authorities , their premises are regularly inspected by them and they cannot involve themselves in unscrupulous activities. If this act is enforced authorities other than Drug Controller will also get opportunity to harass pharma unit owners. Such provisions of the act need to be toned down to save the manufacturers from the hardships,” Vinod Gupta, Senior Vice Chairman, Himachal Drug Manufacturers Association (HDMA) said.
Another issue which is likely to be debated during the convention is arbitrary pricing control practices . NPPA’s price control measures have in fact choked small and medium drug manufacturers which cannot compete with multi nationals and large scale units .
“ The medicines in India are the cheapest in the world. Still the central government introduced Drug Price Control Order in 1995 resulting in disappearance of many life saving drugs from the market. Sadly NPPA fixes prices on the basis of data collected from multinationals and large units . Small units cannot compete with large scale and multinational units as they operate on large scale . As a result small manufactures are on the verge of closures and their products are vanishing from the market. Therefore, the interests of small and medium drug manufactures are required to be safeguarded against such practices,” Vinod Gupta said.
In the year 2002, Schedule-M specifying stringent working conditions by the name of ‘Good Manufacturing Practices’ was introduced with the results, hundreds of small manufacturing units were closed,” Sanjay Guleria, President, Himachal Drug Manufacturers Association (HDMA) said.
Drug manufacturers from Uttrakhand and Himachal Pradesh have unanimously decided not to raise the reduction in Excise issue which is a policy decision of central government.
The special industrial package granted by central government in the year 2003 for 10 years for Himachal Pradesh and Uttrakhand was initially reduced to four years upto 2007, was later extended till March 31, 2010. With the result, the manufacturers planning to put up new units by the end of the year 2013 had to drop their plans. This disturbed the pace of industrialisation in the states .
Indian Drug Manufacturers Association (IDMA) has decided to form its Himachal Pradesh and Uttrakhand chapter on this day. R.C.Juneja, Chairman, Mankind Group will be installed as President of HP and Uttrakhand chapter of IDMA.
