‘What about you?’ At Patanjali hearing, Supreme Court raps IMA for docs ‘advocating’ costly drugs

Top court asserts consumers had a right to know whether they were being misled by FMCG companies too and what agencies were doing to prevent such misuse.

Yog guru Baba Ramdev outside the Supreme Court | ANI

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Tuesday turned the heat on the Indian Medical Association (IMA) – the complainant in the Patanjali “misleading ads” case – and asked whether it had taken any action against its members who allegedly recommend “overpriced drugs” and certain “line of treatment” to patients.

A bench of Justices Hima Kohli and Ahsanuddin Amanullah was hearing a  contempt case against Patanjali founder Baba Ramdev and his associate Acharya Balkrishna for violating their promise of not disparaging allopathic medicine.

The IMA had approached the top court with a plea to direct Patanjali to stop its smear campaign against the Covid-19 vaccination drive and modern medicine.

The judges said Tuesday that the hearing would not be confined to the actions of only Patanjali, which is accused of violating the Drugs and Magic Remedies Act that prohibits advertisement of medicines meant to treat serious diseases such as blood pressure, heart problems etc.

It told the counsel appearing for IMA that while the “petitioner (association) points fingers at respondent (Patanjali)… other fingers are also pointing at you”.

Justice Kohli said members of the IMA have been busy endorsing medicines to patients “left right and centre”. “What are you doing to rein in those members of your association in the allopathic field is a question we need to ask you too. This is not going to be all just that there are FMCGs, there are you and your members who are prescribing medicines on the strength of recommendations made for which there is valuable consideration… If that’s happening, why should we not turn the beam at you?” asked Justice Kohli.

The judges said IMA also needed to put its “house in order”. “There are several complaints with regard to alleged unethical conduct of IMA. Misuse of their position in recommending highly expensive medicines… extraneous medicines for valuable consideration. How many times has this been brought to your notice, and how have you acted upon it,” the bench asked IMA’s lawyer, senior advocate P.S. Patwalia, who assured he would revert with the requisite information in the next hearing.

The bench expanded the scope of the hearing by directing the Centre to let it know what action taken against FMCG companies regarding “misrepresenting advertisements” for products such as food for babies, children and the elderly.

“We must clarify that we are not here to go for a particular party, particular agency or particular authority. It is a PIL (public interest litigation) and is in the larger interest of the consumer public to know which way they are going and how and why they get misled and how agencies are acting to prevent that misuse,” the judges said.

In an indirect reference to the recent controversy surrounding a company that manufactures baby food products, the bench said: “…after going through the kind of coverage that recently has been brought to our notice of the misrepresenting advertisements for things like foods for babies, children, which we now understand is under scrutiny by the Union, the Union will have to tell us something about it.”

The justices said they could not let the public be taken for a ride, adding, “These are children, babies… If that’s happening, the Union of India needs to activate itself and so do state licensing authorities under you. You can’t just shrug your shoulders and say I conveyed the complaint to the state authority and it is for them to do what they are doing.”

About the contempt case against Patanjali, the top court was informed that the group had issued advertisements on Monday in 67 newspapers tendering an unqualified apology for lapses on their part.

Since the advertisements were not placed on record, the court gave it another week’s time to do so. The bench said it would like to see physically whether the advertisements were of the same size as the advertisements that were issued by the group.

(Edited by Tikli Basu)