‘Fake’ masks sold online, NGO seeks checks; HC issues notice to Centre

‘Fake’ masks sold online, NGO seeks checks; HC issues notice to Centre

Rosy.Sequeira@timesgroup.com

Mumbai:23.05.2021 

The Bombay high court (HC) has issued a notice to the Centre, seeking its response to a public interest litigation on manufacture and sale of “fake/ spurious” medical grade face masks on e-commerce sites.

A PIL by an NGO, Friends of Wadala East, urged the HC “to ensure that unregulated manufacture and sale of medical grade face masks does not go unchecked in view of the fact that a proper mask is perhaps the only manner in which transmission of coronavirus can be prevented”.

The NGO cited its experience with Amazon when it placed a bulk order on May 2 for 400 surgical masks for BMC healthcare workers. The masks were delivered on May 8, but did not conform to the description advertised. The website represented it would be of ‘The Mask Lab, 3 ply surgical face mask – international ASTM level certified for virus, dust, air borne particles, pollution.’ On receipt, the petitioners found the same were “shoddy and of substandard quality, poorly packaged and nowhere close to what they described on the portal of Amazon”. The NGO could not distribute the masks. The manufacturer said it had not manufactured the masks that had been delivered. The PIL points Amazon US has strict quality checks in place, mandating approval by Food & Drug Administration. The NGO verified listing requirements of other e-commerce entities and found that “Flipkart and Snapdeal also do not have any system of checks and balances in place and follow a procedure similar to Amazon.”

The PIL said unsuspecting citizens end up buying fake/ spurious masks due to unfair trade practices of unauthorised vendors and e-commerce sites like Amazon “which leaves them with a false sense of belief that they may rely on such spurious masks for protection against the Covid19 and its spread.”

On Thursday, after the nonprofit’s advocates Amrut Joshi and Sujit Lahoti informed a bench of Chief Justice Dipankar Datta and justice Girish Kulkarni about the public interest litigation, they issued a notice to the ministries of health and consumer affairs and posted the hearing for June.

A migrant worker from UP, wearing a face mask and carrying a bottle of hand sanitiser, waits for his train at Pune railway station on Friday