Lucknow, January 11: When the police arrested a peon at the Sanjay Gandhi Post Graduate Institute of Medical Sciences (SGPGIMS), a Lucknow-based super speciality hospital, in connection with kidney smuggling, they thought that he was a small fry, part of a racket that spread up to Chandigarh.
They were flabbergasted when they found that the Grade 4 employee of the Radiology department at the institute was in fact a millionaire many times over. Mehboob Ali, who was arrested on Monday in the kidney transplant racket allegedly owned huge plots of land in Lucknow, Balrampur and Siddharthnagar districts. Apart from owning several palatial buildings in the state capital, he also owned a number of high-end cars, and a hefty bank balance.
“His assets must be in crores of rupees,” said a police official. Ali, a major player in the racket, amassed his wealth over the last three years. The modus operandi of the peon in the X-ray department of SGPGIMS was very simple. He used to lure poor people with money and liquor, and would persuade them to sell their kidneys. Ashok Kumar, a clerk by profession, used to help Ali in preparing fake no-objection certificates, mandatory in transplant cases. The duo were paid hefty sum by a person identified as Harishankar Maurya. Maurya, who was arrested earlier, then used to take the “donors” to Mohali in Chandigarh and places outside Uttar Pradesh.
The accused have admitted to selling kidneys of seven people to a hospital in Mohali. The police did not rule out the possibility of connivance of some more employees of the SGPGI.
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