2 yrs on, Baddi yet to have drug testing lab

Ambika Sharma
Tribune News Service
Solan, October 13

There has been an inordinate delay in setting up a modern drug testing laboratory at Baddi to facilitate the pharmaceutical industry.

The Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare had provided Rs30 crore to the state Health Department in 2017 to set up the lab as part of the 12th Five-Year Plan for strengthening the staff of Drug Control Administration (DCA), including upgrade of its testing labs.

The DCA had purchased a building from the HP Housing and Urban Development Authority to house the modern testing lab in 2017, but nothing much was done thereafter. This has put a question mark on the seriousness of the officials concerned in ensuring quality manufacturing of drugs.

NK Lath, Director, Health Safety and Regulation, said public-sector enterprise HCL had been entrusted with the job of setting up the lab and its officials had recently visited the site.

“They have shortlisted equipment to be installed and the tendering process will begin soon to equip the building with the required facilities, including additional civil work,” Lath said.

The lab is expected to test at least 8,000 to 10,000 legal samples of drugs annually. Since the drugs manufactured in the state also figure in the monthly list of sub-standard drugs, the lab is expected to strengthen the quality control mechanism of the DCA. It will also facilitate the 350-odd manufacturers in testing their drug samples.

In the absence of an accredited lab in the area, the manufacturers have to get their drug samples tested in Chandigarh and nearby places, which is a time-consuming and cumbersome exercise.

The DCA is at present dependent on the ill-equipped Composite Testing Lab (CTL) at Kandaghat for testing drugs.

Since the CTL is not equipped to handle specialised analysis, including microbiology-related investigations in the absence of sophisticated equipment, officials have to outsource such tests from Chandigarh-based labs.

A drug-testing lab in the Baddi-Barotiwala-Nalagarh area, which houses the Asia’s pharmaceutical hub, is a key requirement, especially because it houses as many as 120 export-oriented and renowned manufacturing units such as Dr Reddy’s Lab, Cadila, Cipla, Torrent, etc.

SL Singla, a senior manufacturer in Baddi, said: “With the Central Drug Standard Control Organisation imposing stringent conditions such as bio-equivalence, stability data for every product, this lab will be of great help to the industry. The creation of a stability chamber and related facilities is a costly affair, which can’t be created by small manufacturers.”

To strengthen quality control process

• The lab is expected to test at least 8,000 to 10,000 legal samples of drugs annually
• Since the drugs manufactured in the state also figure in the monthly list of sub-standard drugs, the lab is expected to strengthen the quality control mechanism of the Drug Control Administration
• It will also facilitate the 350-odd manufacturers in testing their drug samples