Earlier this month, a senior executive at Sun Pharmaceuticals (SUNPHARMA), one of the world’s largest purveyors of generic drugs, and his wife settled insider trading allegations brought by Indian regulators. The case stemmed from an episode five years ago, when Abhay Gandhi traded in Ranbaxy Laboratories stock soon after Sun Pharma agreed to buy the company from another drug maker.
Despite the infraction, Gandhi remains with the company as both head of its North American operations and as a director of Taro Pharmaceuticals, in which Sun Pharma owns a controlling stake. Meanwhile, a just few days after he and his wife agreed to pay $100,000 to settle the case, Sun Pharma sent an email to employees about a new policy to make it easier for whistleblowers to convey information about insider trading.
In the April 17 email, the company adopted a new “global whistleblower policy” as of April 1, less than two weeks before the settlement was announced. The policy “enables employees (to) raise concerns against any malpractice like immoral and unethical conduct, fraud, corruption, potential infractions of the global code of conduct,” according to the email, which STAT has obtained.
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