Maharashtra Govt Plans Law To Crack Down On Unauthorised Path Labs: ‘Draft Ready’

Maharashtra plans to enact a law to regulate pathology labs, penalising violators. The law aims to address the proliferation of bogus labs, with provisions for inspections and criminal cases.

The Maharashtra government is set to bring a new law to crack down on bogus pathology labs, state Industries Minister Uday Samant said on Tuesday. The law will provide punishment to the violators, he added. 

Samant’s statement came during the question hour, amid a discussion over BJP MLA Sunil Rane’s query on the number of pathology labs in Mumbai. 

PTI reported that Rane “expressed surprise at the government’s reply that, under existing rules of the Mumbai Municipal Corporation Act 1888, there was no provision for registration of pathology labs”.

Samant said the issue of bogus or unauthorised pathology labs concerns urban development, public health, and medical education departments. The planned law, he added, will regulate pathology labs, and not allow unregistered ones to operate. It will lay down proper rules and regulations, with a provision to form flying squads to check for violations, he said.

Samant said 7,085 candidates had been authorised to operate pathology labs since 2019 by the Maharashtra Paramedical Council. 

BJP MLA Ashish Shelar said bogus labs were exploiting people, and there should be criminal cases against them. NCP (Sharad Pawar) legislator Rajesh Tope said the Nursing Home Act – which aims to register and regulate clinical establishments and the minimum standards of services provided by them – should be amended if the new law is not enforced anytime soon. 

In response, Samant said the draft of the new law is ready, and, if needed, the Nursing Home Act will also be amended.

Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray) MLA Ajay Choudhari said many bogus pathology labs worked in collaboration with government hospitals.

Illegal Labs Mushrooming In Maharashtra

In 2022, Shiv Sena MLC Manisha Kayande had said that there were 8,000 illegal labs in the state, of which more than 1,500 were in Mumbai. She cited the data as the erstwhile Maha Vikas Aghadi government talked about its efforts to bring a framework to regulate pathology labs.

The number of such labs is believed to have increased during the Covid-19 period. A law in this regard is considered important to ensure accurate diagnosis, and property quality standards at these establishments.