Authorities also seized the stock of some other medicines on Monday night and sent their samples for testing, he said. A Madhya Pradesh Food and Drug Administration (FDA) official said 35,000 of the 40,000 Favimax (Favipiravir) tablets received from a firm in Odisha had already been sold by the wholesaler in Gwalior after receiving the stock in April this year.

"About 500 tablets of Favipiravir were seized from a wholesale medical shop located at MK Plaza in Gwalior. The stock was seized and we have sent the samples to a laboratory to ascertain whether they are fake," Drug Inspector Dilip Agrawal told reporters.

He said Odisha's Drug Controller had informed the Bhopal office that a consignment of fake Favimax tablet had been supplied to a medical firm in Gwalior. 'The action was taken following this information," he added.

'It was informed that Favipiravir, a key content, was not found in the seized Favimax tablets,' Agrawal said, adding the allegedly fake tablets were supplied by a firm registered with a fake address. He said the Gwalior-based wholesaler had received a consignment of 40,000 Favipiravir tablets in April this year and sold about 35,000 of these tablets to various medical stores in the city since then. Agrawal said the wholesaler claimed to have returned the rest 5,000 tablets to the supplier.

'Prima facie, Favipiravir, which is a key content, was not found in these tablets. The tablets supplied by the wholesale drug store to retailers are being recalled,' Agrawal said, adding authorities also seized the stock of Medioxy-300, Sneeze, Meditharat 500, Ceefit A3LB from the wholesale medical shop on Monday night.