Can you say "miracle" in Indian pharma promotional material?

Which instrument governs this

Drugs and Magic Remedies (Objectionable Advertisements) Act, 1954, Section 4 (false or misleading claims). Also Section 3(d) read with the Schedule, where the claim concerns a listed disease. The Act's savings in Section 14, and exemptions under Section 15, apply. Also the Uniform Code for Pharmaceutical Marketing Practices (UCPMP) 2024, Clauses 1.3 and 2.1. The manufacturing licence conditions in the Drugs and Cosmetics Rules 1945 also apply to Schedule H, H1 and X drugs (for example Rules 74(p) and 78(q)). The conditions say no advertisement of those drugs 'shall be made except with the previous sanction of the Central Government'. Their text sets no audience limit. How they apply to material addressed only to prescribers is a question for your regulatory team.

UCPMP 2024 does not name this word, and neither does the Act. The test is whether the claim it makes is false or misleading. For a disease in the Schedule to the Drugs and Magic Remedies (Objectionable Advertisements) Act, 1954, evidence does not lift the Section 3(d) bar.

What verification returned

Neither the Drugs and Magic Remedies (Objectionable Advertisements) Act, 1954 nor the Uniform Code for Pharmaceutical Marketing Practices (UCPMP) 2024 names the word. But in an advertisement the Act covers, a 'miracle' claim for a drug will almost always be a false or misleading claim under Section 4. For a disease listed in the Act's Schedule, it is barred under Section 3(d). The Act's Section 5 separately bars people who practise magic remedies from advertising them for the purposes in Section 3. Under Section 2(c), a 'magic remedy' includes any charm 'alleged to possess miraculous powers'. For a drug, though, the tests are Section 4 and, for a Scheduled disease, Section 3(d). The Act covers doctor-directed material too, but Section 14(c) saves an advertisement 'sent confidentially in the manner prescribed under section 16 only to a registered medical practitioner'. Under UCPMP 2024, information must not mislead and must be capable of substantiation (Clause 1.3). Advertising to the public is also subject to the Consumer Protection Act, 2019. It is also subject to the Central Consumer Protection Authority's Guidelines for Prevention of Misleading Advertisements and Endorsements for Misleading Advertisements, 2022. The manufacturing licence conditions in the Drugs and Cosmetics Rules 1945 add a condition for Schedule H, H1 and X drugs (for example Rules 74(p) and 78(q)). They say no advertisement of those drugs 'shall be made except with the previous sanction of the Central Government'. Their text sets no audience limit. How they apply to material addressed only to prescribers is a question for your regulatory team.

How this was checked

Two independent AI models were asked the same question against the live web. They were Gemini 2.5 Pro with Google Search grounding, and OpenAI GPT-5 with web search. A third model then judged whether they agreed on the substance rather than the wording. Every source cited was fetched over HTTP to confirm it exists. A fetch confirms only that a source exists. It does not confirm that the source supports the statement. So on 6 October 2026 the citations on this page were re-checked. They were checked against the official texts of the Code, the Drugs and Magic Remedies Act and the CDSCO 2016 consolidated text of the Drugs Rules. They were corrected where they were wrong. Terms that did not reach agreement between the models are not published.

Sources checked

• UCPMP 2024, Department of Pharmaceuticals (PDF)
• UCPMP 2024 policy page, Department of Pharmaceuticals
• Drugs and Magic Remedies Act 1954, consolidated text on thc.nic.in (PDF)
• Drugs and Cosmetics Act 1940 and Rules 1945, CDSCO consolidated text (PDF)