Health Ministry Drafts Mandatory CCTV at Chemists to Stop Prescription-Drug Sales to Children

The news

New Delhi. The Union Health Ministry has proposed mandatory CCTV surveillance at medical stores to curb the abuse of prescription drugs, The Indian Express reports in an explainer by Anonna Dutt dated September 21. A draft notification requires recordings to be kept for three months. The Ministry said the measure would ensure stricter control over prescription medicines, especially habit-forming drugs listed under Schedule X of the Drugs and Cosmetics Rules, 1945, and that it seeks to address concerns over the “unauthorised access to and sale of Schedule H, H1 and X drugs”. These schedules are lists in the Rules that fix how a medicine may be sold: Schedule H drugs, such as many antibiotics and steroids, cannot be sold without a prescription from a registered medical practitioner; Schedule H1 drugs, such as certain antibiotics and anti-TB medicines, carry additional record-keeping requirements; and Schedule X is a more tightly controlled category that includes some psychotropic medicines. The measure was first proposed in 2021 to prevent the abuse of drugs by children. H.G. Koshia, identified by the paper as head of the Drugs Consultative Committee of the Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation, said round-the-clock surveillance would “create fear” among store owners and pharmacists so that they would not sell such medicines to children without a prescription; the footage is mainly meant to verify whether a sale to a minor took place, and while routine inspection every three months may be difficult, data can be retrieved when there is a complaint. The paper cites a comprehensive AIIMS study of drug use published in 2019: opioid use — heroin, pharmaceutical opioids in strong painkillers, and opium — is the second-most common addiction among children, affecting nearly 1.8% of them, followed by alcohol (1.3%) and inhalants (1.17%), the only form more common in children than adults. Of an estimated 2.3 crore opioid users, 25 lakh depend on pharmaceutical opioids and 63 lakh on heroin, according to the study. The All India Organisation of Chemists and Druggists objects to the cost for small stores, rural power and connectivity failures and, “most importantly”, patient privacy. “Stores might have to shell out nearly a lakh… How can a store with, say, sales of Rs 5,000 to 10,000 do that?” asked its general secretary Rajeev Singhal. The syllabus link is health regulation, child protection and the right to privacy.

Static syllabus linkage

1. Drug schedules decide who may sell what, and on what paper. The Drugs and Cosmetics Rules, 1945, made under the Drugs and Cosmetics Act, 1940, place medicines in schedules that govern labelling, sale and record-keeping. Schedule H drugs may be sold by retail only on the prescription of a registered medical practitioner and must carry the “Rx” warning. Schedule H1, added in 2013 to curb misuse of certain antibiotics, anti-TB drugs and habit-forming medicines, requires the chemist to keep a separate register with the prescriber’s name, patient’s name, drug and quantity, and its label carries a boxed red warning. Schedule X covers narcotic and psychotropic medicines with the strictest controls, including a copy of the prescription retained by the chemist and separate stock records.
2. The NDPS Act runs alongside the drug law. The Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985 regulates narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances and punishes illicit trafficking, while permitting their medical and scientific use under licence. Many medicines in Schedule X are also psychotropic substances under the NDPS Act, so a chemist who sells them illegally may face action under both laws. The Act gives effect to India’s obligations under the UN Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, 1961 and the Convention on Psychotropic Substances, 1971. The Narcotics Control Bureau, set up in 1986, is the nodal coordinating agency.
3. The national survey that underpins today’s figures. The 2019 report on the Magnitude of Substance Use in India was prepared by the National Drug Dependence Treatment Centre of AIIMS, New Delhi, for the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, which is the nodal ministry for drug demand reduction. It is the most comprehensive national survey of drug use and covers both adults and children aged 10-17. The Ministry runs the Nasha Mukt Bharat Abhiyaan, launched in 2020, and a National Action Plan for Drug Demand Reduction. Supply control, by contrast, is the domain of drug regulators and law enforcement.
4. Surveillance must pass the Puttaswamy test. In Justice K.S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India (2017), a nine-judge Bench held privacy to be a fundamental right under Article 21, and any intrusion must satisfy legality, a legitimate aim and proportionality. Video of a person buying medicines reveals health information, which is sensitive by nature. The Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 requires that personal data be processed for a lawful purpose, with security safeguards and limits on retention. A camera mandate is therefore constitutionally possible but must be backed by law, narrowly purposed and protected against misuse.

Why UPSC loves this

1. Drug abuse and child protection are linked themes across GS papers. GS2 covers vulnerable sections and health; GS3 covers the linkages of organised crime and drug trafficking. UPSC has asked about the drug problem in Punjab and the North-East and about the NDPS framework. This story allows an answer to move from trafficking to the legal pharmaceutical supply chain, which is often ignored.
2. Privacy versus public interest is a recurring ethics frame. Since Puttaswamy, questions on surveillance, Aadhaar and data protection ask candidates to weigh a legitimate aim against intrusion. A CCTV mandate at chemists is a compact case for applying the proportionality test in GS2 and in GS4.

Analysis

1. The camera is a confession that the prescription register failed. Schedule H1 already requires chemists to record the prescriber, the patient and the quantity for every sale; if those registers were checked, a camera would add little. The Ministry’s own official says inspection every three months is difficult, which means the problem is inspector capacity, not the absence of evidence. A camera that is examined only on complaint will deter only where complaints are likely, which is rarely the case when the buyer is a child. The policy therefore substitutes a cheap-looking technology for an expensive but necessary inspection cadre.
2. Deterrence by fear works only if footage is actually used. Mr. Koshia’s aim — that chemists be afraid to sell without a prescription — is a legitimate theory of deterrence, and it can work in towns where drug inspectors are active and parents or schools complain. But deterrence depends on perceived probability of detection. If chemists learn that no one reviews footage, the cameras will become part of the furniture. The draft should specify how footage will be sampled, by whom, and with what penalties, or the measure will impose cost without effect.
3. The privacy objection is serious, but it argues for design, not abandonment. Video of customers buying contraceptives, HIV drugs or psychiatric medicines is precisely the kind of data whose leak causes harm. Yet privacy law does not forbid surveillance; it requires a legal basis, a limited purpose and safeguards. A defensible rule would place cameras over the counter rather than on the customer’s face, restrict access to authorised officers on a specific complaint, prohibit use for any other purpose and delete footage after the three-month period. The chemists’ organisation is right to raise privacy, but it may also be using patients’ privacy to protect its members’ convenience.
4. Cost falls hardest where supervision is weakest. A one-time cost of nearly a lakh is significant for a rural store with daily sales of a few thousand rupees, and rural areas also have the power and connectivity problems the chemists cite. The perverse outcome could be that urban chain pharmacies comply easily while rural stores either close — reducing access to legitimate medicines — or ignore the rule. A risk-based approach, requiring cameras first for stores that stock Schedule X drugs or that have past violations, would place the burden where the risk is.
5. Children’s drug use is a demand problem too. The 2019 survey shows that inhalants are the only substance more commonly used by children than by adults, and inhalants are bought at hardware and stationery shops, not chemists. Opioid dependence is dominated by heroin, which is not sold at medical stores at all. Controlling chemists matters for pharmaceutical opioids and sedatives, but a policy that looks only at the counter will miss most of the harm. School counselling, family support and treatment capacity are the other half of any credible response.

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