Ashwin Kotnis, Superintendent of Police, taking a look at the spurious bottles of cough syrup which were seized at Cuddalore on Friday.
CUDDALORE:
The Thirupadiripuliyur police here on Friday busted a drug racket in which the cough syrup of one company was being marketed under another leading brand by changing the label on the container.
The police seized over 242 cartons containing 35,000 bottles of such spurious syrup and about 10,000 fake labels. About 10,000 bottles were in circulation and another 2,300 bottles were being couriered back by the retailers, said Ashwin Kotnis, Superintendent of Police. Addressing a press conference here, Mr Kotnis said that the modus operandi of the operators was to buy a low priced cough syrup, remove the labels and affix another brand name for getting a higher price in the market. However, they did not tamper with the sealed cap of the container nor did they add any additional components. The racket came to light when the Oviya Enterprises at Chennai on suspicion returned a syrup consignment to Cuddalore from where it originated. During inspection Drug Inspector S.Gurubharathi found 2,700 bottles of the syrup with fake labels stacked on the premises of the Selva Vinayagar Agencies situated on the Pidari Amman Temple Street, Thirupadiripuliyur, and seized them. Subsequently, N.Valliappan (26), a dealer of at least 80 medicinal products, surrendered before the Judicial Magistrate Court—III here on March 24, 2010. The police took him into custody for six days and during interrogation he confessed to selling the syrup under a different brand name. As part of his plan to market one lakh bottles of the syrup Valliappan initially got orders for 50,000 bottles. He was assisted by P.Anandan of Bank Street, Nettapakkam, Puducherry, and A.Murugesan of Pandian Nagar, Kazhani Vasan, Karaikudi.
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