Dr R A Mashelkar, former head of the government's Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, has requested the commerce ministry to withdraw the recommendations on patent law issues submitted by a five-member technical expert group, which he chaired, on "ethical" grounds.
The decision has come in the wake of allegations of plagiarism against the Mashelkar panel report.
"We have found that several sentences in the panel's report are identical to one of the submissions made to us by an interest group. I have asked the commerce ministry to withdraw the report. It will be re-drafted and a fresh report will be submitted within three months, after all technical inaccuracies in the existing one are rectified," Mashelkar told Business Standard.
Lawyers Collective, a public interest group, has said that several portions of the report are identical to a four-year-old study by a UK-based intellectual property institute.
The group has further alleged that the UK study was funded by Interpat, an association of multinational pharmaceutical companies.
Mashelkar wrote a letter to Ajay Dua, secretary, Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion, on February 19, stating: "After the submission of the report, it has been found that there are certain technical inaccuraciesÂ… that have inadvertently crept in. This has apparently happened while the initial drafts were attempted by a drafting sub-group for the consideration of the TEG. These were unfortunately not detected on time and therefore not corrected."
The letter added that the decision to withdraw and resubmit a fresh report that "meets the requirements of the highest standards" was taken after consulting all TEG members.
"As the chairman of the TEG, I take full responsibility for this unfortunate development and render my unconditional apologies for the inconvenience that has been caused to the government. There have been 12 high powered Mashelkar committees so far over the last two decades. This has happened for the first time. I am deeply pained by it."
The withdrawal of the report has come at a crucial time. The report has been produced as evidence to support the claim of Swiss multinational Novartis AG in a Chennai court case against the central government.
Novartis has challenged some sections of the Indian Patent Law (which limits grant of drug patents to significant innovations) and cited the Mashelkar report to buttress its arguments. The court is scheduled to hear the case on Thursday.
