Is Deanxit banned in India?

Deanxit is Lundbeck's combination of flupentixol, an antipsychotic, and melitracen, an antidepressant, prescribed in India for anxiety with depression. Scroll.in has called it "the drug that India has failed to ban", which is the fairest one-line summary of its status.

The Health Ministry suspended the combination on 18 June 2013 under GSR 377(E), in the same round as analgin and pioglitazone. Its reasoning was that the product is not approved in most developed markets, including Denmark, where Lundbeck is based. Lundbeck and Indian makers went to the Karnataka High Court, which struck the ban down within months on procedural grounds. The ministry consulted the Drugs Technical Advisory Board and re-banned the combination in 2014. That order was in turn set aside by the Karnataka High Court in December 2017 on petitions by Mankind Pharma and Lundbeck. Since then Deanxit and more than ten Indian generics have been on sale, and a public-interest petition filed in the Delhi High Court by the whistleblower Dinesh Thakur, seeking to enforce the ban, remains pending.

The correct description is therefore a ban that exists on paper and has twice been set aside, with the product legally sold in the meantime. The 2014 notification number and the exact court dates are flagged for verification.

For patients, the medicine is available on prescription. Anyone taking it should not stop abruptly; changes to psychiatric medication need a doctor's plan.