Kidney racket busted by UK police

DAINIK NATION BUREAU

The Uttarakhand Police has busted a kidney transplant racket with the arrest of a middleman in Dehradun district.

The racket was unearthed when two persons from Kolkata were being packed off to Delhi without being paid the amount they were promised in lieu of one kidney each, Dehradun SSP Nivedita Kukreti said.

The racket was being run at Named Gangotri Charitable Hospital.

A middleman from Mumbai, Javed, who had negotiated the deal with them was subsequently arrested from the forests surrounding Lal Tappad between Nepali Farm and Bhaniyawala area of Rishikesh where the hospital was situated. He is being interrogated, she added.

A doctor involved in the racket, Amit Rawat, and Rajiv Chaudhry, who ran the hospital after taking it on a lease from Arun Pandey of Allahabad, were on the run, she said.

The two people whose kidneys were removed were Krishna Das and Sheikh Taj Ali. Two other persons–Sushma from Kolkata and Mauji Bhai from Gujarat–were waiting at the hospital for their kidneys to be removed in return for money.  However, police came to know about the racket before they could be operated upon, the SSP said.

Sharing its details to media Dehradun SSP Nivedita kukreti said that a charitable hospital in doiwala was the centre of the racket. After getting tip off of four persons being taken to delhi via haridwar, a joint team from haridwar and dehradun police conducted a vehicle checking drive at the border areas of these two districts. A car was stopped for checking. Four person including two women and the driver were sitting. they were identified as Bhavji Bhai, from Gujarat while Shekhtaj, Sushma banerjee and Krishna das from west bengal. while driver Deepak Kumar belong to Haridwar.

During interrogation  Bhavji Bhai disclosed  that Javed khan resident of Mumbai had asked him to come to Gangotri charitable hospital for selling his kidney. he had promised to pay him Rs three lakh per kidney. Krishna das and Shekhtaj Ali have already sold their kidneys.

All the four were being taken away to Delhi to be given or assured of the cash.  The agent Javed Khan was also going to Delhi along with them. Meanwhile, the four created a ruckus in the car which led some locals to call up police. With police following the car, Javed got down at a desolate place. Later, he was arrested.  The doctor who operated the kidneys out of the bodies of the donors Amit Rawat is now on the run. More would be revealed once he is arrested,” she said.

On condition of anonymity an officer said that an air ticket booked in the name of one Oman had been recovered. We suspect that the racket trades in kidneys abroad too. The police team members along with the health department and FSL officials are investigating the case. Hospital staffers are being questioned too to verify whether they are involved in the kidney trade or not.