NEW DELHI: The Indian pharma industry has suggested that the proposed Bill to revise the Indian Patents Act, 1970, should have enough provisions, including greater clarity on patentability and safeguards against 'evergreening' to protect the interests of both the domestic industry and the consumers.

In a submission to the Group of Ministers (GoM) examining the proposed Bill, the Indian Pharmaceutical Alliance (IPA) has said the "Patent Act should provide greater clarity to avoid litigations related to patentability and effectively avoid evergreening."

Pointing at litigations pending with various courts on exclusive marketing rights filed by foreign pharma companies, IPA Secretary General D G Shah said, "these have clearly shown their intent to seek patents for new forms of known substances and file cases in courts to keep the generics from the market."

It said, for instance, while Novartis is fighting a case for its anti-cancer drug glivec, GSK has filed a litigation for its anti-diabetic drug rosiglitazone to prevent Indian players to produce generic versions of those drugs.
The Bill should therefore clearly provide that patents intended to delay entry of generics, such as patents for polymorphs, isomers and metabolites, must not be permitted," Shah said.

Stating that the current law was inadequate to prevent 'evergreening', he said if clarity was not brought in, it would lead to litigations and thereby delay the entry of generics on the expiry of the main patent.