THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Contrary to the perception that foreigners were the recipients of the kidney transplantations done at Iranian hospitals at the behest of the international organ trade racket involving Keralites, the police probe found that all beneficiaries were Indians.
The racket facilitated 20 kidney transplantations over the past five years, with all the recipients hailing from the northern states, the police have found.
Sources in the police said the recipients, all of whom have been identified, belong to Rajasthan, Punjab, Jammu & Kashmir and Delhi. They said the probe will verify whether the recipients played any role in enticing the donors, who were lured by the racket to sell one of their kidneys for money.
“We will proceed after checking whether the recipients in any way persuaded people to sell their kidneys. We will then seek legal opinion on whether to book them or not,” said a source.
It is learnt the racket operated with the assistance of two Iranian hospitals and India-based middlemen, some of whom sold one of their kidneys and then turned agents on the lookout for potential donors.
The police team has also identified all the donors — they hail from Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Uttar Pradesh, Delhi and Kerala — and found some of them were cheated by the agents, who did not pay them the full amount offered initially, said sources.
13 persons arrested in organ trade case so far
The donors were given Rs 6 lakh each, while the remaining amount was shared between members of the racket, said sources.
While a total of Rs 12 crore was collected from recipients, only a little over Rs 1 crore was given to donors, the sources said.
Iran has legalised organ donation in exchange for money. Exploiting this, Indians undergo kidney transplantation there.
Out of the 20 donors, just one, Shameer of Palakkad, is from Kerala. He was allegedly cheated by middlemen who did not pay him the full amount promised. Based on his complaint, the police registered a cheating case against the members of the racket who have been arrested – 13 so far.
The police are on the lookout for one more suspect, Madhu Jayakumar, who is in Iran. He is said to be the vital cog in the whole scheme of things and is responsible for managing the racket’s entire Iranian operations.
Kerala’s links to the trafficking racket came to light after the police nabbed Sabith Naseer, a middleman. His interrogation revealed he had played a key role for the racket and helped them harvest organs from 20 people.