INDIAN PHARMA INDUSTRY-CHANGING DYNAMICS_Essay by Akila Nandhini

INTRODUCTION:

                  The Indian pharmaceutical industry today is in the front  rank of india’s science based  industries with wide ranging capabilities in the complex field of drug  manufacture and technology .From simple headache pills to sophisticated antibiotics .In fact ,India has the highest number of US FDA(Food and drug administration) certified manufacturing facilities outside USA.

THE GROWTH STAGE OF INDIAN PHARMACEUTICAL INDUSTRY:

SECTION-1:

       Bengal chemicals and pharmaceuticals limited(BCPL),established in 1901,is a public sector undertaking(PSU) of the government of india and india’s first pharmaceutical company. The company was started  by prafulla Chandra roy in Kolkata and has still manufacturing some Indian products like naphthalene balls and phenol.

     The Nascent industry, however received setbacks in the post world war-II period as a result of new therapeutic development in the western countries that triggered natural elimination of older drugs from market usage of newer drugs like sulpha, anti biotics, vitamins, hormones ,anti histamines etc. This culminated in the discontinuation of local production based on indigenous materials and forced the industry to import bulk drugs meant for processing them in to formulation and for  selling in domestic market.

SOURCE-ISID WORKING PAPER:

          The government started to encourage the growth of drug manufacturing by Indian companies in the early 1960’s.In the post independence period, Indian pharmaceutical industry exhibited four stages of growth.

FIRST STAGE:

 In the first stage during 1950-60 s, the industry was largerly dominated by foreign enterprises and it continued to rely on imported bulk drugs notwithstanding its inclusion in the list of “Basic industries” for plan targeting and monitoring. The inadequate capabilities of the domestic sector to start local production of bulk drugs and hesitation of foreign firms to do so. This led to establishment of the Indian drugs and pharmaceuticals ltd.

SECOND STAGE:

     The industry took place in 1970’s.The enactment of the Indian patent aCt(IPA)1970 and New Drug Policy(NDP) 1978 during this stage are important milestones in the history of the pharmaceutical industry in india. The IPA 1970 brought in a number of radical changes in the patent regime by reducing the scope of patenting to only processes and not pharmaceutical products and also for a short period of seven years from the earlier period of 16 years.

THIRD STAGE:

         In this stage of evaluation Indian pharmaceutical industry developed modern technology for manufacturing of all dosage forms like tablets, capsules, liquid, oral, injectables etc.

During 1980-90’s Indian pharmaceutical industry had emerged as one of the most export oriented sectors in Indian pharmaceutical industry with more than 30% of the production being exported to the foreign market. The trade deflects of seventies had been replaced by trade surpluses of 1980’s.

FOURTH STAGE:

        In this stage evaluation of industry during 1990’s witnessed dramatic changes in the policy regimen governing the pharmaceutical industry. The drug de- licensing, hundred percent foreign investments is permitted through automatic route and price control has been significantly reduced. The term of patenting has also been increased to a 20 year period. The number of pharmaceutical units has also increased to over 23,000 in 2002, and further more.

CONCLUSION:

        All in all Indian drugs sales are excepted to rise by annually between 2006 and 2015mand further is the matter of wait and watch depending upon conditions prevailing in international and domestic markets. In the UNIDO-classification of developing countries, according to the “state of art” in the pharmaceutical sector india is ranked among the top and today india manufactures over 400 bulk drugs and around 60,000 formulations.