New Delhi: The Delhi High Court on Wednesday refused to grant any time to a company to dispose of its existing stock of electrolyte beverages being sold under the name ORSL, which has been banned by the FSSAI from being labelled as Oral Rehydration Salts (ORS).

A bench of Chief Justice Devendra Kumar Upadhyaya and Justice Tushar Rao Gedela said the allegation was not that this product is harmful, but it is a case of misbranding, and it cannot allow such products to remain in the market as the matter relates to public health concerns.

“Sorry, we can’t permit it. Please recall it (stock). We will not permit it. We are sorry. The matter relates to a public health concern,” the bench told the counsel for the petitioner company, JNTL Consumer Health India Pvt Ltd.

The court said the difficulty is that in rural areas, if a child is suffering from diarrhoea, ordinarily, they buy ORS to balance electrolytes.

“In your product, you are also writing electrolytes; there is a possibility of being misleading. It is not harmful to someone who is fit to take it, but it is harmful to those who are unfit to take it,” it said.

It also said that ORS has brought a revolution to a poor country like ours, and the rate of deaths of children has gone down in these areas.

Earlier, UNICEF would distribute these for free, and it is not whether it is harmful, but it is misbranding, the bench said.

The court issued notice to the Centre and the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) on the main petition challenging the Authority’s orders dated October 14 and 15, by which it has withdrawn permissions for food-and-beverage companies to use the word ‘ORS’ in their labelling unless they met the standard medical formulation.

The court listed the matter for further hearing on December 9.

Senior advocates Sandeep Sethi and Mukul Rohatgi, representing the petitioner, submitted that the company had been selling these products for the last 20 years, and the name was registered with the Controller of Patents, GIs and Trademarks (CGPDTM).

Sethi said that although the manufacturing of the product had been stopped, the concern was for the goods in the retail channel, and urged the court to grant permission to liquidate the existing stocks.

The counsel said the manufacturers were not making any claims that their drinks were based on the WHO-approved formula for ORS, and that this had been displayed on their packaging and communicated to the consumers as well.

Rohatgi said there is no complaint that the drink was adulterated and that it is for rehydration.

Additional Solicitor General Chetan Sharma and standing counsel Ashish Dixit, representing the Centre and FSSAI, opposed the plea on the ground that it was a serious matter of public health concern.

The petition said that through the orders, FSSAI has triggered an abrupt, nationwide and immediate regulatory orders of seizure, recall and prohibition on the manufacture and sale of the petitioner’s electrolyte beverage ORSL, which has been legitimately manufactured, marketed and sold in India for over 20 years under valid licences and continuous regulatory supervision.

It said this action has effectively nullified decades of lawful business activity and has upended an entire sector without any lawful basis.

Earlier, a single judge of the high court had dismissed a plea by Dr Reddy’s Laboratories Ltd challenging the FSSAI’s directive restricting use of the label ‘ORS’ for its oral rehydration solution brand Rebalanz VITORS.

The single judge had said the measures taken by the FSSAI were impelled by “serious public health considerations” and were regulatory measures applicable across the food industry.

On October 14, the FSSAI issued an order withdrawing all prior permissions for food-and-beverage companies to use the term ‘ORS’ in product names or branding unless they met the standard medical formulation.

The food safety regulator deemed the use of ‘ORS’ in branding by sugary or electrolyte drinks as misleading to consumers, particularly children, and in violation of the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006.

ORS is recommended by the World Health Organisation and is given to people suffering from dehydration.

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