Apollo kidney racket: Doctors to be quizzed; 3 more arrested

Ten doctors are likely to be questioned by the police in connection with the kidney racket busted in Apollo Hospital here last week, even as three more persons, including two women, were today nabbed while the kingpin remains at large.

With this, the total numbers of arrests in the case has gone up to eight.
All ten doctors in Apollo Hospital's internal assessment committee for transplant surgeries will be quizzed, a senior police official said.

The committee comprises senior doctors working at the hospital, independent doctors and a government doctor.

The three arrested have been identified as Umesh and Nilu, who are husband and wife residing in Kanpur, and Mamta alias Maumita, wife of one of the five accused arrested last week. All three of them are kidney donors associated with the racket, the official said.

However, efforts to track down the kingpin, Rajukumar Rao, who is suspected to have links with similar rackets in Nepal, Sri Lanka and Indonesia, have not yet yielded any results.

During interrogation, Umesh and Nilu told police that they had sold their kidneys for Rs 4 lakh and Rs 3 lakh respectively as they were in urgent need of money for their minor son's leg surgery.

They also told police that when they came to know about the actual price in which their kidneys were sold, they felt deceived, an official privy to the investigation said.

The third accused, Mamta, is the one who actually led police to the kidney racket.
On the day it was busted, Mamta was spotted indulging in a heated exchange with her husband, Devashish Moulik, and when the police intervened, on receiving a call regarding the matter, they were stunned by what they heard. Mamta accused Devashish of cheating her with the amount he received after her kidney was sold.

During investigation, it came to light that Devashish had offered his own kidney first but on being declared unfit he convinced his wife to do so, the official said.

Five cases of organ sale have been detected with the recovery of large number of original files, CDs and documents seized by the police and further investigation is in progress, Randhawa said.

A case under different sections of IPC and Transplant of Human Organ Act (THOA) has been registered at Sarita Vihar police station in connection with the kidney racket.

The arrest of the five accused has also led to recovery of fake id proofs such as voter photo identity cards and Aadhaar cards, laptops.

The entire documentation and verification process for organ transplant was bypassed by using forged papers related with agreement of donor, relationship with donor, id and address proofs, proof of marriage and clearance of case by Hospital Internal Authorisation Committee, Randhawa said.

All the necessary documents were made fraudulently by affixing donor's photo showing the person as recipient's relative using documents of a genuine relative, he added.

Apollo hospital denied involvement in the kidney racket emphasising that it was a "victim" of a well-orchestrated operation by the accused.

"The police in their investigation has identified secretarial staff of some doctors, who have been accused of being involved in the alleged racket. We reiterate that these are not employees of the hospital. While all due precautions were conducted, the use of fake and forged documents was used for this racket with a criminal intent. The hospital has been a victim of a well-orchestrated operation to cheat patients and the hospital," the statement by hospital stated.

The hospital also claimed that in order to ensure compliance with the law and diligence in process, it has an independent body with external members also for according consent for any transplant surgery.

This Committee goes through all documents necessary to ensure that requirements under the concerned Act are complied with. Further, the hospital has ensured that all due process as per the law has been followed, added the hospital statement