Rajasthan Health Minister Raghu Sharma on Thursday said that the state government will not allow the sale of Patanjali's Ayurvedic formulation for treating COVID-19 in the state.
"We will not give permission to Patanjali to sell their anti-Corona drug in the state. We will decide once they get approval from Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR)," Sharma told reporters here.
"There is currently no medicine for corona, WHO, ICMR has no medicine or vaccine. Any clinical trial has to be conducted with ICMR's permission, any clinical trial without ICMR's permission is not legal as per my knowledge," he added.
The minister further said that the government would not have had any problems if the company would have advertised and claimed it was an immunity booster product.
"We are not against Ayurveda, it is an ancient science and practice. We are ourselves distributing kadha here in Rajasthan to boost immunity. There is no fight between Ayurveda versus Allopathy here," he added.
Earlier today, AYUSH Minister Shripad Naik had said that Patanjali Ayurved should not have advertised its newly-launched ayurvedic drugs for COVID-19 before getting final approvals.
"They (Patanjali Ayurved) should not have advertised it (Coronil) before getting final approvals. We have asked them to complete the requisite procedures. They have sent it to us and we will take a decision soon," Naik said.
The AYUSH Ministry had said on Tuesday that it has taken cognizance of news in the media about Ayurvedic medicines developed for the treatment of COVID-19 by Patanjali Ayurved Ltd, Haridwar and said the company has been asked to "stop advertising/publicising such claims till the issue is duly examined".
( With inputs from ANI )