The special teams formed by Superintendent of Police Asra Garg to nab the gang involved in the kidney racket on Wednesday questioned 11 persons, including three women.
Police picked up these persons from Dharmapuri, Salem, Namakkal, Erode and Coimbatore districts with the leads provided by the touts who were arrested in the last two days.
The police also questioned Village Administrative Officer (VAO) of Maniyambadi P. Murugan to ascertain if he had issued a fake relationship certificate to facilitate unauthorised kidney trade. The suspicion was that he had issued such a certificate to enable S. Balasubramaniam of Dharmapuri to give a kidney to Ramesh, a college teacher from Udumalpet.
Police said the VAO denied having issued such certificates to anyone. The District Crime Branch on Wednesday registered a case of cheating and criminal intimidation against Ayyavu, the alleged tout, on the basis of a complaint that he had taken money from a person who needed a kidney but did not return the sum. The person later died without receiving the organ. The DCB registered cases under Sections 406 (criminal breach of trust), 465 (forgery), 468 (forgery for the purpose of cheating), 471 (using forged documents as genuine), 420 (cheating), 506 (2) (criminal intimidation) of Indian Penal Code and Section 19 of Transplantation of Human Organs Act, 1994. One more tout, Sigamani (53) was arrested late in the night from D.G.Pudur in Gobichettipalayam taluk in Erode district. He was brought to Dharmapuri for further questioning.
