The Indian government is reportedly close to withdrawing the right of drugmakers to set their own prices for innovative new meds, PharmaTimes reports. Earlier this year, the National Prescription Pricing Authority warned the government that it believed companies were abusing this freedom by setting the initial price at over-inflated levels, in order to get round the requirement that the price of a new drug should not rise by more than 10 percent in a single year.

Market surveys by the Authority have found widespread abuse of the system, and local reports now say that multinational drugmakers have also been getting round this requirement by importing innovative new medicines rather than manufacturing them locally, as doing so would have allowed the authorities to check on the drug’s production costs.

Around three-quarters of products on India’s pharmaceuticals market are not under price control. The NPPA has now however recommended to the government that marketing approvals, which are granted by the Drugs Controller General of India or the individual states’ own authorities, should be conditional on acceptance of a price set by the Authority.