Nashik hair growth oil seized: FDA cites bald-cure claims, no licence details

The Maharashtra Food and Drug Administration (FDA) seized 5,040 bottles of an Ayurvedic hair oil worth about Rs 50.35 lakh in Nashik on Thursday, 5 November 2026, over claims that it could grow hair back on bald heads and over missing licence details on its labels. The oil, sold as "VS Hair Growth Oil", was being promoted on Instagram and Facebook. The FDA's Nashik division found the stock during an inspection of a business that ran a beauty salon and sold imitation jewellery, and said the bottles did not carry the manufacturer's name and address or a manufacturing licence number. The action was taken under the Drugs and Cosmetics Act, 1940, and the FDA said it was still trying to trace the actual maker. The seizure was reported on Friday, 6 November.

Ayurvedic medicines are licensed products in India. A bottle sold as an Ayurvedic medicine is expected to tell the buyer who made it, where, and under which licence, so that a problem can be traced back to a factory. In this case, according to the FDA, none of that was on the label. That is why the regulator acted under drugs law rather than treating the oil as an ordinary cosmetic.

The second issue is the claim. Promising to grow hair on a bald scalp is a strong medical claim, and the FDA described the promotion as misleading. Here the product was sold with a traditional-medicine label and promoted mainly through social media, where a claim can reach thousands of buyers long before a regulator sees the bottle. Anyone worried about hair loss is better served by a qualified doctor or Ayurveda physician than by an advertisement.

For the Ayurveda sector, cases like this cut both ways. Licensed makers who follow labelling rules compete with unlabelled stock sold at a high price; and every seizure of a product making a cure claim adds to public doubts about traditional medicine as a whole. The Ayush system's own push in recent years has been toward evidence, standards and quality control, which depend on exactly the kind of traceability this oil lacked.

The seizure also came in the week before Diwali, when the Maharashtra FDA and food regulators in several states have been running drives against adulterated sweets, ghee and other festive goods. This action concerned a drug product rather than food.

Peepals calculation: the reported value matches the bottle count and the printed price almost exactly: 5,040 bottles × Rs 999 = Rs 50,34,960, or about Rs 50.35 lakh. In other words, the value is the full retail price of the stock, not what the seller paid for it. Our calculation from the reported figures.

Short-term: The stock is off the market in Nashik, and the FDA's investigation now turns to the unnamed manufacturer behind the product.

Long-term: The case adds pressure on social media sellers of Ayurvedic and herbal products to carry full licence details, and on platforms where such claims are promoted.

Who is affected: Buyers who ordered the oil online, the Nashik business where it was found, licensed Ayurvedic manufacturers who compete with unlabelled goods, and regulators in Maharashtra.

Questions and Answers