A suspected kidney racket has been busted in Guntur district of Andhra Pradesh with the police registering charges of cheating and impersonation against a 30-year-old man, a prospective kidney donor from Durgi mandal in the backward region of Palnadu.
The latest episode involving distress sale of kidneys has brought back haunting memories of “kidney sale”, in the drought-hit Palnadu in the year 2002.
The police are now probing whether there is similar a well-oiled network consisting of few corporate hospitals in Guntur, middlemen who identify a prospective donor and the local revenue and police officials indulging in giving residence and family certificates based on false data furnished by the touts.
At least two other cases relating to impersonation of identities based on Aadhaar cards at Narsaraopet are being investigated by the police.
Applications for kidney transplant are given by the authorisation committee headed by Superintendent, Government General Hospital, Guntur, and comprising nephrologist, urologist and transplant surgeon, along with certificates of residence and family structure given by the revenue and a police verification certificate. In case where the donor is outside the family, both the donor and the recipients have to furnish self affidavits.
It is to avoid the cumbersome process of furnishing documents, hospitals have been accused of having a nexus with touts to furnish false documents making unrelated kidney donor as related family member of the recipient. Police suspect lot of money might have changed hands in accomplishing this task.
In this latest case, the police have charged Mudvat Venkateswarlu Naik with morphing a picture on his Aadhaar card and submitting false affidavits to get a residence and a family certificate. The police are probing into possible links of the accused with a corporate hospital in Guntur, where the renal transplant surgery is supposed to take place.
The police have booked cases under Sections 420 IPC, 468 IPC, 471 IPC. The accused is still at large and police teams are looking for him.
Deputy Superintendent of Police K. Nageswara Rao said that cases have been booked against the accused after a complaint was lodged by Tahsildar, Narsaraopet Vijaya Jyothy.
Preliminary investigations revealed that the accused, with alleged support of touts had created a colour photocopy of Aadhaar card in the name of Ravuri Ravi Chowdary, who was registered as a prospective donor to donate his kidney to Chigurupati Siva Nageswara Rao, a resident of Chandramouli Nagar in Guntur. The accused had mentioned that he has been living in Prakash Nagar, Narsaraopet for the last 10 years. The Mandal Revenue Officer, Narsaraopet, processed his applications and after field verification, issued a residence and family certificate.
Caught on verification
But during the course of a police verification, it had emerged that the bar coding of Aadhaar card revealed that the card belongs to Venkateswara Naik. Further field inquiries by the police showed that the accused had just taken a house at Prakash Nagar on rent 10 days back. Realising the faux pas, the tahsildar lodged a complaint with the Narsaraopet One Town police.
“The applicant had come to me in October, 2017 seeking a certificate residence and a certificate of family structure. I have signed on the certificates basing on the report submitted by Revenue Inspector and VRO, but later the police verification revealed that the accused had faked his Aadhaar ID,and produced false affidavits,” said Ms. Jyothy.
Managing Director of Vedanta Hospitals Chinta Ramakrishna said that the hospital had no connection with the accused and added that they have been following all the guidelines stipulated for processing the applications for renal transplants.
