VISAKHAPATNAM: A few days after the closure of Sraddha Hospital which was allegedly involved in illegal kidney transplantation, Maharanipeta police arrested its managing director Dr D Pradeep Kumar late on Sunday night. He was remanded in judicial custody by a local court till June 4.
According to Maharanipeta CI Kesava Rao, Dr Pradeep was taken into custody late Sunday night from his residence at Seethammadhara. Dr Pradeep along with Sraddha HR (Admin) JK Varma were allegedly involved in the illegal organ transplantations performed in the hospital in the last few years.
The hospital which was established in 2010 started performing organ transplantations since 2012. In the report submitted by the three-member committee constituted by city police to probe into the racket, it was said that the hospital had performed 66 organ transplantations including 16 under the NTR Vaidya Seva.
It may be recalled that the police had also arrested three people before, including Manjunatha, an ayurvedic doctor from Bengaluru who acted as the mediator between donors and kidney patients. The other two were Sraddha Hospital nephrologist D Prabhakar, who performed transplantations, and Human Resources Officer (Admin) JK Varma.