Puri: The Drug Control Department has in the past two days conducted a series of raids at various medical stores in Puri. The action by a central team comes after the detection of a fake medicine racket in the city, wherein medical store owners were found selling expired medicines as also spurious drugs.
Drug control officers Harmohan Mohanty and Sunil Kumar Nayak, accompanied by two special teams, raided various medical stores at Hospital Chowk and Market Chowk area of Puri.
There were complaints that medical stores in the area have been using spirit to remove the manufacturing date, batch number and expiry date on the medicine strips/bottles, after which they are freely sold in the market.
The raids were conducted also to stop the sale of spurious medicines posing health hazards and to check sale of medicines by unauthorised shops and medical stores.
Puri Drug Inspector Rudra Narayan Sahoo has said sale of date-expired medicines is a crime and those caught in the act will be booked under the Drugs and Cosmetics Act.