Police in Bengaluru arrested two women on May 20 including a 25-year-old contract doctor working with the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) for allegedly black marketing COVID-19 vaccines. According to media reports, the accused are Dr Pushpita who was attached with the Manjunathanagar Primary Health Centre (PHC) and her relative Prema, a resident of ITI Layout. Sanjeev Patil, Deputy Commissioner of Police (West), said that the vaccines, which were meant for the public and were to be administered for free, were kept at Prema’s residence. Police said that they were being administered at Rs 500 per dose to private beneficiaries there daily post 4 pm from April 23, according to The Times of India.
The duo was caught red handed after police received a tip off and posed as a beneficiary. The same day, police had arrested four persons, including two doctors working with a Primary Health Centre (PHC), for allegedly running a racket of issuing fake COVID-19 certificates and black marketing antiviral drug Remdesivir. According to the police, two of the accused persons have been identified as Dr B Shekhar (25) and Prajwala, who worked as medical officer and doctor, respectively, at the PHC in Chamarajpet in the city.
The two other accused have been identified as Kishore G (22) and Mohan Y (29) years, both employees with private hospitals. The police said in a statement that the Halasuru Gate police formed a special team and set up a trap for these doctors. "We set up a decoy team and carried out a detailed sting operation to bust this racket," DCP Central, MN Anuchet, told reporters.
According to the statement released by the Bengaluru Central Division police, these doctors used to work in tandem with the two employees working in separate hospitals, who used to refer patients to Chamarajpet PHC, where these doctors used to charge Rs 500 to issue a fake RT-PCR negative certificate. "The same team was also involved in black marketing of Remdesivir for Rs 25,000 per vial. We have recovered 11 vials of 20 ml/100mg each from their possession," the police said.
(With IANS inputs)