New Delhi. Regarding misleading advertisements, the Supreme Court said on Tuesday that ‘we cannot allow the public to be deceived.’ Along with this, the court asked the licensing authorities of the Center and the State to prepare themselves to deal with misleading advertisements.
The Supreme Court said that the Court also questioned the Center regarding the August 2023 letter of the Ministry of AYUSH, in which the licensing authorities were asked not to initiate any action under Rule 170 of the Drugs and Cosmetics Rules, 1945. The court also pulled up members of the Indian Medical Association (IMA) for prescribing extremely expensive medicines.
A bench of Justices Hima Kohli and Ahsanuddin Amanullah, hearing the case related to the misleading advertisements of Patanjali Ayurveda Ltd, said that many other companies (FMCG) are also going on this path and the Center will have to answer about what it has done. Have done. The bench said that we cannot allow cheating the public. If this (misleading advertising) is happening, then the Government of India needs to activate itself and the state licensing authorities will also have to do the same.
The bench told the counsel for petitioner IMA that when the association is pointing fingers at Patanjali, ‘the other four fingers are also being pointed at you (IMA).’ The bench said that you cannot just shrug your shoulders and say that I have informed the state authority about the complaint and now it is their job. He said that all this is not happening just because of FMCG. It is you and your members who are prescribing drugs based on recommendations… If this is happening, why should we not pay attention to you?
On this, IMA’s lawyer said that he will look into the issue. The bench also asked the Center what complaints it has received against other ‘FMCG’ companies and what action has been taken on them? During the hearing, Justice Amanullah said, ‘I will not take the name of the channel. The news was being broadcast on the channel that this has been done in the court today and on the other side the advertisement was coming. What an irony!
The Supreme Court is hearing a petition filed by the IMA in 2022, alleging a campaign to defame the Covid vaccination drive and modern systems of medicine. During the hearing on Tuesday, the Supreme Court also took note of an intervention petition seeking imposition of a fine of Rs 1,000 crore on the IMA for filing the petition.
Senior lawyer Mukul Rohatgi, appearing for yoga guru Ramdev and his associate Balkrishna, told the bench, ‘I have nothing to do with this. I don’t have any information about this. The bench said that we are very curious about the timing of the application.” She said that she would consider the application when the applicants appear before the court. The next hearing in the case will be on April 30.
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Tags: Advertisement, Supreme Court
FIRST PUBLISHED: April 23, 2024, 18:43 IST