Patanjali banned from advertising its products by the Supreme Court. Why so?

On February 27, the Supreme Court of India made a decision that goes against the Patanjali Ayurved company owned by Baba Ramdev. The decision said that the company is not allowed to publish advertisements that are misleading in nature. The Supreme Court banned Patanjali Ayurved from marketing its products until another order was passed.

The bench that took the decision comprised Justice Ahsannudin Amanullah and Justice Hima Kohli took the decision. As per the court, the advertisements published by Patanjali Ayurved attacked allopathic medicines even after giving the court an assurance of abstaining from them in November last year. In November 2023, the company stated that no casual statements that claim any medicinal efficacy or stand against any system of medicine are going to be released to the media in any manner.

The allegations

A petition was filed to the Supreme Court by the Indian Medical Association in August 2022. This came after an advertisement was published by Patanjali. The title of the advertisement that brought the company into legal trouble was, "MISCONCEPTIONS SPREAD BY ALLOPATHY: SAVE YOURSELF AND THE COUNTRY FROM THE MISCONCEPTIONS SPREAD BY PHARMA AND MEDICAL INDUSTRY."

Moreover, as per the petitions, there have been many cases where Baba Ramdev called the field of allopathy a "stupid and bankrupt science". Additionally, Baba Ramdev has also claimed many times that many deaths during COVID-19 were caused due to allopathic medicine. Furthermore, the Indian Medical Association also claims that Baba Ramdev promoted vaccine hesitancy in the times of the COVID-19 pandemic by spreading false rumors.

As per the Indian Medical Association, attacks like these on modern medicine via a continuous spread of misinformation walk beside the efforts of Patanjali to make false claims relating to the cure of many diseases through Patanjali products.

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The Supreme Court's take

So far, the Supreme Court has warned Patanjali Ayurved many times relating to making misleading advertisements. However. on February 27, the court decided to take a stricter approach to the matter.

It was on 21st November last year when the Supreme Court heard the case for the very first time. Patanjali was orally warned by Justice Amanullah against making claims that the Patanjali products are enough to completely "cure" diseases. Patanjali Ayurved was threatened by the Justice that Rs 1 crore would be imposed on every product for which a claim like that is made. The focus of the court has been specifically on curbing the spread of misleading advertisements and not on deciding in the debate of Allopathy versus Ayurveda.

Patanjali assured the Supreme Court through Senior Advocate Sajan Poovayya that there won't be any violation of the laws, specifically related to advertising or branding of the products of Patanjali.

However, the story did not end there. An anonymous letter addressed to Justice Amanullah and the Chief Justice of India was received by the court on January 15 this year. The letter talked about the continued publishing of misleading and false advertisements by Patanjali. The next hearing came on February 27 when the court noted that the company actually continued with its act of publishing advertisements that actually claimed to offer "permanent relief" for diseases. 

The court deemed the actions of Patanjali as "unacceptable". The court put a blanket ban on such advertisements until any further orders on any branding or advertising of Patanjali medicinal products ahead are made. The court warned Patanjali again relating to making statements against conventional medicine on any media front.

The next hearing on the case is scheduled to be on March 19.

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