The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Detention in spurious drugs case upheld

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Friday, Dec 24, 2010
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Detention in spurious drugs case upheld

Special Correspondent

No procedural irregularity committed, says High Court

CHENNAI: The Madras High Court on Thursday upheld the detention of 13 persons under the Tamil Nadu Prevention of Dangerous Activities of Bootleggers, Drug Offenders, Forest Offenders, Goondas, Immoral Traffic Offenders, Sand Offenders, Slum Grabbers and Video Pirates Act in connection with the alleged ‘spurious drugs scam' case.

In its common order dismissing the Habeas Corpus Petitions challenging the detention, a Division Bench comprising Justices Elipe Dharma Rao and D. Hari Paranthaman, said there was no procedural irregularity or illegality committed by the authorities concerned at any stage of the detention orders. Viewing from any angle, the Bench said, it was unable to find any illegality in the detention orders.

The detention of Meenakshisundaram, Venkatesan and 11 others on April 8 this year by the City Police Commissioner, was challenged by their kith and kin on relatively similar grounds.

The allegation against the detenus, being either stockists and agents, and others, was that they collected expired drugs from various pharma companies, recycled them as valid drugs by altering the batch number and expiry dates and pushed them back into the pharmaceutical retail market.

On a complaint by the Drug Inspector, Drug Control Department, the Kodungaiyur police registered a case against the detenus and others.

Detention challenged

The petitioners challenged the detention on various grounds which included non-mention of an amended provision of law in the order, delay in producing the accused before the court and non-intimation of the arrest of detenus to their relatives, delay in depositing the contraband before the court and non-supply of certain documents and translated versions.

The Bench observed that rag-pickers in the city and its suburbs were in for a surprise when they reaching dumping yards in the middle of March this year as along with wastepaper and discarded polythene sachets, there were huge quantities of medicines in vials, tubes, bottles and strips. It came to be known that spurious and time-barred drugs had found their way to dumping yards in Tamil Nadu following a government crackdown on what turned out to be an illegal pharmaceutical supply chain.

Truckloads of counterfeit medicines were moved out from wholesale godowns to retail outlets after being made to appear genuine by using sophisticated technology in printing and packaging. “It is seen that the share of Tamil Nadu in drug export is Rs.3,500 crore which accounts for 10 per cent of the medicine exported by the country, and the value of drugs produced in the State annually is Rs.6,000 crore. But, as a result of this shameful scam, which has sent shock waves throughout not only the State but also the country, the reputation of the State has been drastically brought down, further making the importers to view each medicine with suspicion besides causing panic among the innocent purchasers of medicine.

This scam put dent to the reputation consistently earned and so far maintained by Chennai as the Mecca of Medicine and the hub of medical tourism,” the Bench said.

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