Modi Govt Helps 5-Month-Old Teera, Waives Off Rs 6 Cr Tax For Importing Life-Saving Medicines

Praises for Prime Minister Narendra Modi flooded social media after the central government decided to waive off taxes on the import of life-saving medicines for a five-month-old girl suffering from a rare medical disease.

Mumbai's Teera Kamat suffers from Spinal Muscular Atrophy (SMA) Type 1. It is a rare genetic disorder that leads to a complete breakdown of nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord affecting muscle movement.

In January 2021, Teera's parents, Priyanka and Mihir, had shared the medical condition of their daughter on social media. They mentioned that Teera was critically ill and was undergoing treatment. The treatment, however, required the necessary medicines—one of the drugs that targeted the genetic root cause of the disease was Zolgensma, which had to be imported from the USA.

They had pointed out that 23 per cent import duty and 12 per cent GST added ₹6 crores to the cost of ₹16 crores that the treatment costed. They had managed to raise ₹12 crores in a span of 75 days through crowdfunding but faced challenges to raise the additional tax amount.

They urged the Prime Minister to waive import duty and GST on medicines.

In February, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Devendra Fadnavis wrote to PM Modi and Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman requesting them to exempt all applicable taxes on the import of medicines

"The parent of Teera Kamat have raised the ₹16 crores through crowdfunding. Therefore, this should be made a special case to save the life of this child," Fadnavis said in his letter.

The Prime Minister responded to Fadnavis' letter saying that amount pertaining to the customs duty would be exempted for Teera.

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