The Bombay High Court bench of Justices Kamal Kishor Tated and Nitin Borkar last week allowed Biovet Private Limited, an associate firm of the Bharat Biotech, to take over the "ready to use" plant in Pune to manufacture Covaxin.
The bench has also issued a specific directive to the chief conservator of forests, Pune division, the district collector and other concerned authorities to ensure that mandatory permissions and clearances are give to Biovet within reasonable time so as to enable the firm to start manufacturing the vaccine at the earliest.
This comes after Biovet petitioned Justice Tated's bench seeking to quash the deputy forest conservator's orders, who refused to grant nod to the company to manufacture vaccine in this particular unit.
In it's plea, Biovet highlighted the shortage of vaccines and stressed on the fact that the company is one of the only three institutes presently manufacturing vaccines in the country.
The plea further stated that the original owners of the ready-to-use BLS-3 vaccine manufacturing plant in question - Internet India Private Limited, planned to shut down the site and had even agreed to hand over the unit to Biovet for manufacturing the vaccine.
Appearing for the state, advocate general Ashutosh Kumbhakoni told the bench that the government had no objection to grant such permissions to the company, however, it should not claimed any kind of equity while relying on the permissions given, during the final hearing of this plea.
Responding to the state's submissions, the counsel for Biovet submitted an undertaking before the bench stating that it wouldn't use this permission in future to claim any equity.
Accordingly, the bench ordered the authorities in Pune to grant the requisite permissions, without wasting any time.
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