Pune: The rapid spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, led to an increase in the demand of hand sanitisers. This further led to a shortage in supply of sanitisers. As a result, manufacturers and shopkeepers began selling sanitisers at exorbitantly high prices until the prices were capped.  

Hand sanitisers and mask are essential products that work as preventive measures against the novel coronavirus. They also play a vital role in an effort to curb the spread of the virus.

But in an effort to restrict possible malpractices and duplicate production, the Pune Division of Food and Drug Administration had limited the production capacity to 14.18 lakh litres approximately.

Following this, the Central Government had also given direction to the State government of Maharashtra to grant permission to distilleries and manufacturing companies to manufacture sanitisers.

Recently, The Central Government has also given a green signal to allow the distilleries to produce hand sanitizer. In the meantime, the Pune Division of Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had also given the nod to 22 manufacturing units. But considering the increasing number of cases, the approval was extended to 61 such companies. 

Currently, a total of 7.72 lakh litres of hand sanitisers are produced each month as claimed by the FDA. 

With its head office in Pune, the FDA's Pune division consists of five major districts namely Pune, Satara, Sangli, Kolhapur and Solapur. 

Talking about the situation an FDA official said, "due to the increase in demand of hand sanitizer, they were being sold at high prices. In an effort to overcome these problems, we conducted a few raids and initiated actions against these institutions. A few of these units were also sealed. We also confiscated counterfeit sanitisers from there units.  Currently, the Central Government has fixed the price of sanitisers at 50 paise per ML. "

Speaking to Sakal Times, Kantilal Umap Commissioner of State excise department said, "currently in the state, 82 sugar factories are producing hand sanitisers. During the year 2019-20, 545 lakh metric tonnes of sugarcane has been crushed, and 15 lakh metric tonnes of sludge is available. 250 litres of spirit is produced from 1 metric ton of sludge. The state sells an average of 55 crore domestic and foreign liquors every year. So the available spirit will not fall short for the production of wine."