Dunkel Draft on Drug Patents-Background and Implications

Dunkel Draft on Drug Patents Background and Implications Sudip Chaudhuri THE patent system in India is currently regulated by the Patents Act, 1970. It replaced the Patents and Designs Act, 1911 in 1972. In Section I of this paper, we will discuss how the transnational corporations (TNCs) enjoyed a monopoly status under the act of 1911 and thwarted indigenous efforts to develop the pharmaceutical industry. The provisions of the 1970 act, particularly those relating to drug patents, improved the condition of the indigenous sector, which gained at the cost of the TNCs. In Section II we will briefly mention some of the important changes introduced by the 1970 act. India however has been under pressure from some developed countries for quite some time now to amend the 1970 act. In the last section we will be concerned with the background of these pressures and the implications of some of the proposed changes, particularly in the context of Indian pharmaceutical industry's experience with the acts of 1911 and 1970.