Kidney racket: 2, including informer, under scanner

There are more twists and turns in the LH Hiranandani Hospital kidney racket. With five arrested doctors already in police custody, two other suspected doctors applied for anticipatory bail and two more new names emerged as the accused in the case on Thursday. Interestingly, one of two new suspects is allegedly the man who acted as an informant for the police during the initial stages of the investigation.

Sources in the Powai police revealed that the two new accused have been identified as Sunder Singh and Vinod Patel. Ironically, after the police had received a tip off about the racket from a social worker, they had taken the help of Singh to gather further information.

“In the current case, the social worker who informed the police about the racket had heard of Singh, who had also allegedly fallen victim to the racket, earlier this year. We had earlier named him as a witness in the said case, but investigations have revealed that he was also involved in the racket,” said an officer from Powai police station.

He added that Singh was a middleman involved with Bijendra Bisen, the alleged mastermind of the racket.

Police sources revealed that Singh had also been named in the report submitted by the Directorate of Health Services (DHS). A three-member panel began investigations in the racket after it was busted and recently indicted five doctors from Dr LH Hiranandani hospital. The five, including the CEO Sujit Chatterjee, were arrested late on Tuesday night.

“Bisen got in touch with Singh around three months ago and allegedly coaxed him into kidney donation. However, after the surgery, he did not give Singh the promised amount of money. When Singh approached Bisen again, he told him that the person who received the kidney had duped him. Later, he persuaded Singh into earning easy money by getting him kidney donors,” said a police source, adding that Singh, who survived with menial jobs, would routinely supply Bisen potential clients.

“We are investigating whether in this case Singh, too, had supplied some people ready to sell their kidney,” the source added.

Meanwhile, another senior police source, privy to the report, informed that the second accused, Patel, is a known history-sheeter and was also arrested by Gujarat Crime Branch in 2007. “Patel had been involved in organ transplant racket in many states, including Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat. His name had cropped up even during the investigations in the racket that was busted by Mumbai Crime branch in 2007,” said the officer.

The source added that they were still probing his involvement in this case. “There are chances he may have been involved in other kidney transplant operations conducted in different hospitals earlier. We are investigating this angle,” the officer said. On Thursday, the hospital also issued a statement mentioning, “In the wake of recent turn of events, the Board of Trustees at Hiranandani hospital have appointed EY (Ernst & Young) to implement a stringent audit of the transplant cases conducted at the hospital. Dr LH Hiranandani hospital is extremely saddened by the irregularities and is immediately taking corrective action. The hospital had earlier appointed a five-member committee to examine the documents of the past six months relating to organ transplant cases. The discrepancies, thereof, were reported to the police.”