Troubles for the leading drug firm Ranbaxy just got worse yesterday with the Supreme Court getting a public interest litigation (PIL) seeking cancellation of Ranbaxy Laboratories licence and for initiating probe against the firm for allegedly manufacturing and selling adulterated drugs.The PIL filed by an advocate comes in the wake of the pharma major was fined $500 million by the US food and drug administration last month  for making and selling "adulterated" drugs, has also sought sealing of all its manufacturing units in the country, including those in Paonta Sahib in Himachal and Dewas in MP.

 

Early this week, the European authorities also warned that they were planning to penalize Ranbaxy for the same type of omissions and commissions, while its current Japanese owners have threatened to file an international arbitration against the company’s former owners—the Malvinder and Shivider Singh brother of the Fortis group now.  The court asked petitioner, the advocate M L Sharma, to complete the technical requirements with the registry before taking it on board for hearing. 

 

The petitioner has also sought a direction for prosecution of Ranbaxy's current and former directors. In his petition, the advocate has contended that making and selling adulterated drugs is a heinous crime and "amounts to committing murder" and a person who knowingly does it is liable to be prosecuted under the IPC. He sought a bar on any further sale of drugs manufactured by the pharma company and also seizure of the entire properties of the directors of Ranbaxy. 

 

He claimed that despite Ranbaxy pleading guilty to supplying adulterated drugs in the US and it being fined such a huge amount, the Centre has not taken any action to prohibit or ban the drugs made by the company. He also sought action against the Central Drug Standards Control Organization for permitting Ranbaxy to sell drugs in the country, especially in the wake of the results of the US findings against the Delhi-based company.The petition said Mumbai's Jaslok Hospital has already banned Ranbaxy drugs.