50-80%
Government-stated savings range for Jan Aushadhi medicines
About
A reference tool for comparing brand-name and Janaushadhi medicines.
Dawa Sasta brings together existing public information so that a user can begin with the name on a prescription, review the recorded composition, and see whether a lower-cost Janaushadhi equivalent may exist in the current dataset.
It is intended for information and reference only, not for prescribing decisions. The purpose is to make composition and price information easier to interpret so that patients can ask better-informed questions with a doctor or pharmacist.
Why This Matters
Why medicine price comparison can be difficult for patients.
Many people in India still pay more for medicines than they need to. Across studies, medicines with the same active ingredient can show very large price differences across brands, and the Government of India says Jan Aushadhi products are typically about 50% to 80% cheaper than branded alternatives. A 2024 prescription-based cost analysis also reported price disparities of roughly 5 to 21 times across common medicines used for diabetes, hypertension, and dyslipidaemia.
India has already expanded the scheme significantly, but scale alone does not remove confusion. People often start with a brand name, while most tools expect them to already understand the salt, strength, and formulation they should search for. That is the gap Dawa Sasta is trying to reduce.
18,646
Jan Aushadhi Kendras reported as of February 28, 2026
2,110
Medicines in the reported scheme product basket
How The Site Is Intended To Be Used
Begin with the prescribed brand name.
Dawa Sasta starts where patients actually start: with the brand name on the prescription. The goal is to identify the matching composition and strength, show whether a Janaushadhi equivalent exists, and make the savings visible immediately.
It does not try to replace a clinician or pharmacist. It tries to make price and composition clear enough that people can ask better questions.
01
Start with a prescribed brand.
02
Match composition and strength.
03
Show price and savings more clearly.
Generic Medicines In Plain Language
What is meant by a generic medicine?
Generic medicines are not a different kind of treatment. They contain the same active ingredient as the original brand-name medicine and are meant to work in the same way in the body. To count as a true generic match, the medicine should line up on strength, dosage form, and route of administration, not just the broad molecule name.
A generic can still look different from the brand. The color, shape, packaging, or some inactive ingredients may change, but that does not automatically mean the medicine is worse or weaker. What matters is whether the active ingredient is the same and whether the product meets the required quality and bioequivalence standards.
Generic medicines are usually cheaper because manufacturers do not have to repeat the original discovery and full development pathway from scratch. In India, the market is also shaped by branded generics, so the same underlying molecule may appear under many names at very different prices. That makes price comparison harder for patients than it should be.
Switching is not something people should do carelessly. The exact composition, strength, and formulation matter, and combination medicines need especially careful matching. This is why Dawa Sasta is designed as an information tool, not a source of medical advice.
For Jan Aushadhi medicines specifically, the Government says products are sourced from WHO-GMP-certified plants and batches are tested before supply. The useful question is not “cheap versus real”, but whether the generic is an exact and reliable match for what was prescribed.
Trust And Limits
A public-interest reference, not a marketplace.
This project does not sell medicines, route transactions, or earn commissions on what people buy. Its purpose is to reduce information friction in a market where medicine costs can affect adherence, out-of-pocket spending, and household financial stress.
India already has useful pieces of this puzzle: official PMBI product information, store locators, the Jan Aushadhi Sugam app, and platforms like Tata 1mg that explain substitutes by matching composition and strength. But these functions are still fragmented across interfaces.
To deserve trust, each comparison should stay traceable. Users should be able to see the composition, strength, formulation, source link, and update date behind a result. Lower price should never be framed as “switch without checking”.