Pramesh S Jain.Yogesh K Porwar
Bengaluru CCB officials busted Remdesivir black marketing racket and arrested seven persons including medical store staff in nexus with the nursing home and hospital staff selling Remdesivir vaccination in black market in two separate incidents on Thursday.
The CCB has carried a special drive from last one week against the blackmarketing of the drugs and seized 55 injections so far and arrested 16 accused.
Sandeep Patil,Joint commissioner of police crime,told media persons,In the wake of growing complaints of black-marketing of Remdesivir injection amid the resurgence of COVID-19 cases.
We launched a massive drive and simultaneously conducted raids in five police station limits based on credible information received from our inputs three teams swung into action and were tasked to identify such and launch a crackdown on such medicals.
we received secret information that they are black marketing Remdesivir and other life saving drugs.
The special team of police arrested four people on Thursday from Commercial street police station limits.
The four accused were identified as Hujefa and Matin working at Sonalika medicals,KP Suman Karthekeya,a medical distributor,and Prakash who was working in Venkateshwara medicals.
Another team of officials led by Basavaraj A Teli, from Organized Crime Wing, received credible inputs that a medical store situated at Kothanur dinne is illegally hoarding life saving drug as Remdesivir injunction and selling in double the price.
Based on information a special team led by Basavaraj A Teli sent Shantharaju a head constable as decoy to check at Parvathy Medical store situated at Kothanur Dinne.
Shantharaju posing as prospective customer went to the medical store seeking the injection for which the staff told him to Pay Rs. 22,000 per vial.
After confirming the lead the head constable Shantharaju decided to order more after getting suspecting of big racket he ordered for four before alerting his senior who was waiting at a distance for the confirmation to carry the raid.
As soon as the shop keeper got four injection vials the officials later raided Parvathy medical store and arrested,Prakash Choudhary,24, Vinod Choudhary,25,Abhishek M,30 who had sourced the vials from the adjacent parvathy clinic,through their contact identified as Rohini who is on run.
During Investigation it was found that the drugs had an exclusive not for sale sticker on the medicine box stated as strictly for hospital and institutional set up use only.
The Konanakunte police have registered the FIR against the accused under drug control act and taken them into custody to question them further to ascertain whether the accused had hold the drugs in blackmarket earlier.
In another incident,CCB team led by Girish Naik, received a secret information that two persons are standing in front of ST John’s hospital main and are in possession of Remdesivir life saving drugs.
Based on information the team rushed to spot and caught duo identified as, Shivashakthi,24,and Ramdas,25 red handed in front of ST John’s hospital main gate while they were trying to sell Remdesivir vial to the people .
During investigation the duo told the police that they have sourced the drugs from their contact Syeda Kousar,nurse of a Spoorthi hospital situated on Chocolate factory road in BTM layout.
A detailed investigation by the team it has revealed that she told the duo to sell the medicine for Rs.15,000 per vial and promised to share the profits equally .
The Koramangala police have booked trio under drug control act by and efforts are on to arrest Kousar he said.
Meanwhile till today the CCB police have booked six cases and 16 accused including two medical distributors have been arrested so far.
Currently,several teams of the crime branch have been deployed and tasked to identify and launch a crackdown on such people who are hoarding illegally life saving drug and blackmarketing it.FIR has been lodged against all the accused and further investigation is on said by Basavaraj Bommai, Home Minister.
Finally Home Minister of Karnataka, Basavaraj Bommai,DG-IGP, Praveen Sood,has appreciated,Commissioner of police,Kamal Pant,Joint CP,Crime,Sandeep Patil, KP Ravikumar,DCPs,as,BS Angadi,ACPs as, Gautham kumar,Nagaraj,PIs,as,Hazaresh Killedar,Mallesh S Bolletin,Girish Naik,and staff,as,Shantharaju and other staffs who has conducted a successful raid and arrested all the accused and a suitable reward will be given to the team for the exemplary work done by them he added.
