Police grill pharma director over Remdesivir stock; BJP fumes

 

 

 

MUMBAI police questioned a pharma company director following information that thousands of vials of the Remdesivir drug critical in coronavirus treatment were to be flown out of the country, an official said on Sunday. Police said they had information that the Remdesivir stock was going to be flown abroad by air cargo, despite a ban on the export of the drug. Police on Saturday night questioned Rajesh Dokania, director of Bruck Pharma, a Daman-based pharmaceutical manufacturing company that manufactures Remdesivir vials. Dokania was called for questioning from his home in north Mumbai suburb Kandivali by Ville Parle police around 8.30 pm and allowed to return around midnight. Police had information that at least 60,000 Remdesivir vials are being exported through air cargo, a police official told PTI. Meanwhile, Mumbai police are likely to call the director a pharma company for one more round of questioning for allegedly stocking thousands of Remdesivir medicine vials, an official said on Sunday.

 

As the Remdesivir quantity was large, police decided to question the company director to know about the drug stock. “He had stocked at least 60,000 vials. The Government had allowed him to sell the stock meant for export in the domestic market due to scarcity of the drug,” the official said. “We acted in the good faith as such a huge stock can serve the need of the patients here (in Maharashtra) too,” DCP Manjunath Singe said. The Opposition BJP in Maharashtra objected to the pharma executive’s grilling by Mumbai police, saying the State Government was playing politics amid the pandemic. It now appears that the stock had been arranged by the BJP for distribution in Maharashtra. On learning that Dokania was being questioned, former Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and another state BJP leader Praveen Darekar rushed to the police station.

 

They said the Maharashtra unit of the BJP had taken the initiative to reach out to various pharma companies due to the shortage of remdesivir. “It was our sincere attempt to get Remdesivar for Maharashtra,” Devendra Fadnavis said. “Four days ago we had requested Bruck Pharma to supply us remdesivir but they couldn’t until permission was given. I spoke to Union Minister Mansukh Mandaviya and we got FDA’s permission,” Fadnavis said. The BJP leader claimed that a Maharashtra minister’s officer on special duty called the pharma executive and asked him how he could provide remdesivir on the appeal of Opposition parties. The pharma director was picked up from his house by 10 policemen, Fadnavis said, describing the action as “beyond his imagination”. The Leader of Opposition in Maharashtra Assembly said the State Government was harassing the pharma company as BJP leaders had approached him for the supply of the antiviral medication to Maharashtra.