The government has been sitting over its draft to amend the Drugs and Magic Remedies (Objectionable Advertisement) Act, 1954, which aimed to take stringent action against misleading advertisements, including Ayush medicines, for the past four years.
The ministry, which has kept the draft proposal in cold storage, had proposed the draft amendment after concerns were raised over the effectiveness of the Act.
The draft amendment also widened the scope of the Act by introducing 24 diseases and disorders, including the fairness of skin, improvement in the height of kids and adults, premature ageing, and drugs for treatment for enhancing sexual performance.
In an RTI reply dated November 7, the Union Health Ministry said, “..it is still pending..no further noting is available.”
The response of the ministry came after the Supreme Court’s severe drubbing of yoga guru Baba Ramdev for circulating misleading advertisements of his Ayush products, which included eye drops, Drishti eye drops, with the claim that they treat glaucoma or cataracts, double vision, colour vision, retinitis pigmentosa, and night blindness.
According to the DMR Act of 1954, advertising such claims is prohibited.
Kerala-based Dr K V Babu said he had filed a fresh RTI on November 4, keeping in mind the apex court warning to Patanjali Ayurved that they would “come down heavily” on them if they are found to violate any of its orders on advertising misleading ads of its Ayush products.
“It is surprising that the government has been sitting over its proposed draft amendment to the DMR Act to curb misleading ads for more than four years. There is no movement of the files for the last two years,” he told this paper.
“I wonder if the 'ease of doing business' is more important for the government than public health, even after the SC seized the matter in the Patanjali Ayurved case,” said Dr Babu, who had relentlessly pursued action against Ramdev for the past several years.
The amendment to the DMR Act, 1954, which prohibits the advertisement for specific purposes of remedies and treatments alleged to possess magic qualities, was proposed by the ministry on February 3, 2020. This act applies to all drugs, including Ayurvedic, Siddha, Unani drugs, and Homoeopathy medicines.
The government came out with the draft bill after concerns were raised on the implementation and effectiveness of the Drugs and Magic Remedies (Objectionable Advertisement) Act, 1954, the ministry had informed Dr Babu, an ophthalmologist, in an earlier RTI reply last year.
The ministry published the draft bill on February 3, 2020, and sought stakeholder comments. However, after that, there was no move to implement it.
Currently, the penalties under the Act include provisions like a first-time conviction to be punishable with imprisonment of up to six months and a fine. A subsequent conviction may result in imprisonment of up to a year and a fine.
The draft bill proposed increasing the penalties.
For the first conviction, the punishment will be imprisonment of up to two years and a fine of up to Rs 10 lakh against a six-month imprisonment presently under the act. For any subsequent conviction, the imprisonment may extend to five years with a fine of up to Rs 50 lakh extending from imprisonment of one year as of now in the Act.