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Police unearths more seedy details how kidney scam flourished
Tribune Reporters

Gurgaon, January 28
The Gurgaon police has approached the CBI for issuance of a red corner notice against Amit Kumar, the alleged kingpin of the kidney transplant racket, amid fears that he had fled the country.

Police commissioner Mohinder Lal said the police today raided two houses in Omax, Sector 56, and S.L. Tower on the MG road Gurgaon and found documents of eight luxurious cars in which patients were transported during their treatment. It also found information on eight bank accounts of Amit.

The police had also identified 10 labs in Gurgaon and Delhi, where tests of the patients were conducted. He said agents of Amit used to keep an eye around urologists to find out needy patients, who would be able to foot their demand of Rs 18 lakh for kidney.

Lal said Amit’s e-mail account had 48 request mails from different parts of the country and abroad, mostly Greece. The police also raided Mohit Hospital at Noida, which was run by Amit. Five nurses and 20 staff members used to assist him in the racket in the hospital.

Sources said apart from Amit, Jeevan and Sharaj, the police was now looking out for two more doctors, namely Rajesh and Satya Prakash Gupta, suspecting their role in the racket.

He said the police was also suspecting the role of the local medical fraternity, which did not inform about such a big racket.

Refuting the allegation of the Moradabad police about the leakage of information, Lal said they informed them about the raid only when they had reached outside the accused’s clinic. “Had they informed us earlier, we would have planned to raid all his hideouts simultaneously and there would have been chances of Amit being nabbed,” he added.

Two persons from Greece were allowed to leave the country as they had been operated in Greece and not here and another was released as his kidney transplant was not possible. All of them were on a tourist visa to India.

Three of the ‘donors’, who are admitted to the Gurgaon Civil Hospital, in their statement to the police, said the accused forcibly removed their kidneys after sedating them.

Gurgaon police to grill driver

FARIDABAD: The Faridabad police has handed over the driver of Dr Upender Rastogi, the alleged accused involved in the kidney transplantation racket, to its Gurgaon counterpart.

Sources said the district police was taken into confidence by its Gurgaon counterpart that the driver, Harpal, was a vital part of the kidney racket as he had important information.

The district police had summoned the driver after conducting preliminary investigations on January 25.

IMA panel to probe racket

New Delhi: The Indian Medical Association (IMA) has set up a three-member committee to look into the kidney transplantation racket unearthed in Gurgaon last week.

The IMA also favoured a CBI probe into the kidney racket and said it would launch a nationwide awareness programme in this regard and will press the government to open more cadaveric organ retrieval centres.

National president of the IMA Dr M. Abbas here on Monday said the committee would look into the circumstances that led to the racket and make recommendations to ensure that such incidents did not recur.

The fact-finding committee, which would comprise of Dr Vinay Aggrawal, Dr Dharam Prakash and Dr S.C.L. Gupta, would submit their report within a week.

The IMA has called upon the government to set up kidney banks across the country, one in each district. They said the procedure for organ donation should be made as simple as blood donation.

Dr S.N. Mishra, honorary secretary general, IMA, said the association would persuade the government to amend the Transplantation of Human Organ Act, 1994 to make the provisions more friendly for the recipient and the donor.