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During the course of inquiry, a large number of witnesses were
summoned and examined. Each witness who was summoned, was
informed beforehand the purpose of his appearance before the
Tribunal and asked to bring his statement in writing in the form of an
affidavit. He/she was asked to read the said statement/affidavit
under a fresh oath before the Tribunal. The statement in writing was
exhibited on record. Any questions of the Tribunal which were
responded to by the witnesses under oath were transcribed and the
witnesses signed the transcript. The documents produced by the
witnesses were marked appropriately and placed on record.
The aforesaid procedure was adopted to make the
proceedings of the inquiry transparent, more efficient and to remove
any room for ambiguity about what was said. All witnesses
consented to the aforesaid procedure. At no stage was there any
disagreement.
Members of the public were given a right to appear before the
Tribunal. Any person who expressed a wish to appear before the
Tribunal was asked to approach the Registrar who gave such
person an intended time and date on which the Tribunal would hear
him/her. Owing to the sensitive nature of the inquiry and to avoid
causing panic amongst public at large arising out of various facts
which were likely to be probed by the Tribunal relating to the
quality, safety and efficacy of pharmaceutical products
manufactured within the Country, procedures followed by doctors,
clinicians and the fact that hundreds of lives had been lost on
account of alleged use of contaminated/spurious drug, it was
considered appropriate and prudent to grant only limited access to
media persons who were provided the requisite information on a
daily basis by way of a press release by the Registrar of the
Tribunal. Television cameras and crews were not allowed to cover
the proceedings. Hearings were conducted on day-to-day basis
from Mondays to Fridays. I would like to thank all participants for
their commitment to our schedule.