A Chennai-based doctor emerged as the prime suspect, in addition to two gangs of mediators operating from Chennai and Visakhapatnam, in the Saroornagar kidney racket case.
A special police team of Rachakonda Commissionerate is trying to trace the doctor who used to come to Alaknanda Hospital and perform the surgeries. Initially, officials of the Medical and Health department were sceptical of any doctor transplanting kidneys in that hospital as it did not appear to have the required operation theatre with all facilities.
However, investigators confirmed that the surgeries were conducted at Alaknanda Hospital, having found two ailing donors and two receivers in the same hospital.
A probe by Saroonagar sleuths revealed that the doctor used to be flown in from Chennai. Though he would come from the airport to the hospital in a car, the four-wheeler would be stopped at some distance.
The doctor would then get into an auto-rickshaw and reach the hospital. The gang of mediators took this precaution so that the doctor is not identified. This was disclosed by one of the two persons, Gopi (receptionist) and Sumanth (a doctor owning the hospital), arrested by police. They were presented before a local court which remanded them in judicial custody.
Two gangs of mediators are connected to the racket. While one is based at Chennai, the other at Visakhapatnam. “Their arrest would help us connect the dots and explain how donors and receivers were identified,” a police officer seeking anonymity said. The gang used to identify persons from poor families in need of money and would offer ₹4 lakh and ₹5 lakh to them to sell the kidneys. In the Saroornagar case, ₹55 lakh was collected from one receiver and ₹40 lakh from the other.
After paying the agreed sum to the donor, the remaining sum was distributed by the gang members among themselves, the doctors, Avinash Shetty of Alaknanda hospital, the investigators believe. The police also found that similar kidney transplantations were performed by these gangs of mediators at two other hospitals in Hyderabad.
The kidney racket, the police surmise, had been going on since 2023 in Hyderabad. So far, these gangs had coordinated with the hospitals and the doctors, and got over 30 transplantations executed (including 10 at Alaknanda hospital), the police believe. Efforts are on to identify the donors and the receivers in all these cases.
