Is Oxytocin banned in India?

Oxytocin is the hormone injection used to induce labour and to stop bleeding after childbirth. It is on the WHO's list of essential medicines, and it is also one of the most misused drugs in India, injected into dairy cattle to force milk let-down and into vegetables to make them swell.

In 2018 the Health Ministry used Section 26A to restrict, rather than ban, the drug. The Gazette order confined manufacture of oxytocin for domestic use to a single public-sector company, Karnataka Antibiotics & Pharmaceuticals, barred its sale by retail chemists and required supply to go directly to hospitals and clinics. Private manufacturers and hospital associations challenged the order in the Delhi High Court, arguing that a single supplier risked shortages in obstetric emergencies, and the matter went on to the Supreme Court. The Delhi High Court set the order aside in December 2018 and the government appealed to the Supreme Court; the final outcome has not been published. This page therefore describes oxytocin as restricted, not banned.

What is not in doubt is the clinical position. Oxytocin remains the standard treatment for post-partum haemorrhage, and hospitals have continued to receive it throughout the litigation. Any oxytocin sold to the public, and any used on animals or produce, is illegal whatever the outcome of the court case.