The Bengaluru Central Crime Branch (CCB) police on May 27 arrested two more persons in a case related to the cash for bed scam in hospitals. Joint Commissioner of Police, Crime, Sandeep Patil identified the two accused as Yashwanth Kumar M, (21) and Varun S, (20). The latter was working at the BBMP South Zone War Room. Beds were allotted through the centralised system of the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP), police said.
"One of the accused, Varun, was working in the BBMP South Zone war room, and was learnt to have shared patient numbers with his friend Yashwanth. Yashwanth then used to contact the patients referred to demand money for bed booking," Patil said. The CCB sleuths earlier on Monday had also arrested 34-year-old Babu, who is said to be a close aide of BJP Bommanahalli MLA Satish Reddy in the same case. With these two arrests, the police have arrested 11 persons till date.
The cash for bed scam came to light when Bengaluru South BJP MP Tejasvi Surya, along with uncle and Basavanagudi MLA Ravi Subramnya, Bommanahalli MLA Satish Reddy and Chickpet MLA Uday Garaudchar, had stormed into the BBMP South Zone War Room on May 2, to expose the "cash for bed scam". However, with the arrest of Babu on Tuesday, who is said to be a close aide of Reddy, the said scam has caused severe embarrassment to the ruling BJP.
As soon as this expose came into the limelight, Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa had ordered a CCB probe into the scam. However, the 16 Muslim men who lost their jobs as a fall out of the ‘expose’ led by Tejasvi Surya are yet to get back their jobs.
Ahead of the expose, a three-member committee led by V Ponnuraj (IAS officer-in charge of State COVID-19 War Room) was formed on May 3 by Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike Commissioner Gaurav Gupta to plug loopholes in the Palike’s Central Hospital Bed Management System. (CHBMS). The committee had submitted a 33-point recommendation on May 7.