Ayush Dept drops long-pending bill to set up pharmacy council in view of proposed NCHER

With the government firm on its move to establish the National Commission for Higher Education and Research (NCHER), the much-awaited bill to set up a different pharmacy council for streams under Ayush with a view to standardise the education system for pharmacists under different branches of alternative medicines has gone redundant.Though a revised version of the original bill --the Indian Medicine and Homoeopathy Pharmacy Council Bill, 2005 - aiming to set up a separate pharmacy council is ready for Cabinet approval, the Department of Ayush has now dropped the bill itself as the proposed NCHER is expected to cover the education courses including the pharmacy training also among other things.The bill, introduced in August 2005 in the Parliament, was planned to regulate education and practice of pharmacists in Ayush, as there was no standardisation and uniform education system of curriculum available for training pharmacists in the sector. The standing committee attached to the health ministry examined and submitted the report in July 2006, but it has been pending ever since.Finally the bill was revised by the Ayush department, as per the recommendations of the committee, and was sent to the Ministry of Law and Justice for vetting. Sources said the bill was cleared by the law ministry and was ready for submission to the cabinet for final clearance, but the new proposal of NCHER has made it totally irrelevant. The proposed NCHER will have under its jurisdiction also the proposed activities which pharmacy council could take up and there was no need for another statutory body like pharmacy council, sources said.Meanwhile, the HRD Ministry has already circulated the draft of the revised Higher Education and Research Bill, aiming to regulate the education sector including medical education under a single overarching body, among the various ministries for comments. Initially the Health Ministry had opposed inclusion of medical education under it but an expert group of the ministry has now accepted the revised bill, it is learnt.

Source:Pharmabiz