Pharmacy owners are irked by the recent drives conducted by the Directorate of Consumer Rights Protection to check price hikes of the mosquito repellent brand, Odomos, amid the mosquito-borne dengue outbreak in the country.
Despite the repellent being in stock, the pharmacies have temporarily stopped selling Odomos and Goodnight Roll-On brands to consumers in an attempt to prove that the price hikes are justified and the harassment caused by regulatory bodies unjust.
Only customers known to the owners have managed to get a hold of the repellents although no receipts are issued. Others, in the meantime, have resorted to obtain the much-sought after repellents online at exorbitant prices in an attempt to protect themselves from becoming affected.
This artificial crisis in the supply of effective repellents in the market has put the common people in distress despite their willingness to pay the high price.
Responding to queries about the reason behind the discrimination, an employee at Lazz Pharma who wished to remain anonymous said that sale had been temporarily stopped to strangers after the directorate members came in the guise of customers on Sunday (Aug 4) and fined them over the high prices.
A pharmacy owner in Kalabagan said that people would learn a lesson if the sale remained suspended.
Directorate members who had conducted the drives said that they had not put an embargo on the sale of the product but had only penalised the pharmacies for charging high prices unfairly.
It has become a common practice among businesses to profiteer during perilous circumstances and it must be checked, they said.
The repellents were being sold at much higher prices for the past two weeks since the dengue outbreak.
In a drive conducted in Kalabagan and Gulshan on Sunday (Aug 4), the Directorate of Consumer Rights Protection fined five supershops and pharmacies for charging between Tk 300 to 548 for each tube of Odosmos that was previously sold for Tk 125.

On Sunday (Aug 5), a customer was told at an outlet of Lazz Pharma at Panthapath that they had decided to stop selling the product because of the drive the day before.
After the customer later shared the matter in a post on Facebook, spot visits found that many pharmacies in Kalabagan had also adopted the same strategy to punish those who were complaining about the prices.
Pharmacies in Kalabagan including Tazrin, Priya Enterprise, Asian Pharmacy and Kashem Drugs declined to sell the product and gave no concrete reason for it.
One seller in Kalabagan said that Odomos was brought to the country from India through special arrangements and soaring demand for it had raised its prices.
He said that they could not be fined for charging higher prices when it now cost around Tk 300 to import the product.
Lazz Pharma’s General Manager Anowar Hossain told Bangla Tribune that no Odomos cream had been sold at the store in the past one week as it couldn't be sold for any less than Tk 250.
The pharmacy was trying its best to cater to the needs of the customers by selling them cheaper repellents of other brands, added Anowar Hossain.
Despite the excuses, it was found that one customer was able to buy one tube of Odomos and one Goodnight Roll-On without a money receipt from another outlet of the pharmacy on the day.
Assistant Director of the Directorate of Consumer Rights Protection Afroza Rahman said that the drive had been conducted after they themselves bought the products from the outlets at exorbitant prices.
“There can be no possible relation between the drive we had conducted and the stores not declining to sell the product,” she added.