Talcum powder mixed fake medicines supplied to government hospitals in Maharashtra instead of antibiotics

Mumbai: Antibiotics delivered to some of the government hospitals in Maharashtra were spurious and fake and contained talcum powder and starch, according to the charge sheet filed in a court in Nagpur this week, months after the inter-state gang was busted.

The states where the racket ran included Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Jharkhand.

The counterfeit antibiotics were manufactured in a veterinary medicine laboratory in Haridwar. Hawala channels were used for transfer of money.

The Nagpur Rural police and the Food and Drug Administration were involved in the investigations. More than half a dozen people were named in the charge sheet.

The inter-state gang has been involved in distributing fake medicines since 2021, which also included the period of Covid-19 pandemic.

They supplied fake versions of commonly prescribed medications, including Ciprofloxacin, Livofloxacin, Amoxicillin, Cefixime, and Azithromycin, under the names of defunct firms.

The gang has earned Rs 15 to 16 crore from the racket by supplying spurious medicine. The fake medicines had made their way to Nagpur, Thane, Wardha, Latur, Nanded.

“Further investigation of the crime is going on and it is known that the accused in the crime have also sold fake medicines in the state of Jharkhand, Haryana and some more threads are likely to come out in the further investigation,” officials said.

“The money for fake drugs in Nagpur was being sent from Mumbai to Saharanpur in Uttar Pradesh through a hawala racket. It is resulting in a big chain of crimes. In such a situation, the question arises as to how the Home Minister of the state calls himself the protector of the people,” the Maharashtra Congress said in a statement.