"For the people to be assured that the pandemic is under control and for the governments to ensure, and for agencies engaged in the frontline battle to safeguard people's health, more kits/tests should be made available urgently at the lowest cost throughout the country," said Justice Najmi Waziri while capping the price of the medical kits.
The court was hearing a plea by Rare Metabolics Life Sciences to seek the release of 7.24 lakh Covid-19 rapid test kits and other Covid-19 related material being imported by the respondent from China.
The Indian Council of Medical Research had placed an order with Rare Metabolics for 500,000 test kits at Rs 600 each on March 27 and 28 for a total of Rs 30 crore.
Rare Metabolics routed the order through Matrix, which is licensed to import medical material. Matrix imported the kits at Rs 245 each, or a total of Rs 12.25 crore, the court said. It supplied the kits to Rare Metabolics for Rs 21 crore.
The court observed that Rare Metabolics, in turn, made a profit of Rs 9 crore "despite no value addition to the imported medical material."
Of the Rs 30 crore, which is to be paid by ICMR, Rs 18.7 crore constituted the intermediaries' margin, the court said.
"The country is going through an unprecedented medical crisis affecting public order. People have been cloistered in their homes or constrained to stay wherever they were on March 24, 2020. The economy is virtually at a standstill for the last one month. There is an element of disquiet apropos one's safety. Public interest must outweigh the private gain. The lines between the parties should give way to the larger public good," the court observed.
While the firms have delivered 276,000 kits to the ICMR, the court has instructed that the remaining 224,000 kits be delivered when the consignment lands in India.
Meanwhile, ICMR took to Twitter to bust fake claims about the price of rapid test kits. A post claimed that 17 companies were ready to provide rapid test kits for Rs 500 but PM Modi gave the contract to a Gujarati company which is going to sell it for Rs 4500.
ICMR refuted this allegation and clearly stated that the price range approved for Rapid Tests by them is Rs 528-795 and no test has been procured at Rs 4500.
The tweet further mentioned that Indian companies that wish to sell the kits at a lower price are welcome to contact ICMR.
(With Agency Inputs)
Watch: Korean company steps up to manufacture corona testing kits for India.