India's NPPA to collect over $516 million for overcharging from drugmakers, including MNCs

India’s National Pharmaceuticals Pricing Authority (NPPA) has issued notices to pharmaceutical companies for overcharging, claiming that arrears totaled 23.33 billion rupees ($516 million) until January 31, 2011, with only 2.02 billion rupees so far clawed back reports the local Pharma.biz news service.

“On detection of overcharging cases since inception of NPPA on August 27, 1997 and till January 31, 2011, NPPA has issued demand notices in 786 no of cases involving an amount of Rs 2,328.53 crore...," Minister of State for Chemicals and Fertilizers Srikant Kumar Jena said in a written reply in Lok Sabha (India’s lower house of Parliament).

The practice of overcharging continued unabated, if the trend is any indication and almost all the biggies have their names in the list published by NPPA recently. Last time when the NPPA disclosed the details, the total arrears stood at 22.8 billion rupees, until October 31, 2010. The arrears went up by another 1.2 billion rupees within the last three months.