HYDERABAD: The Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) officials on Friday arrested former director of Insurance Medical Services (IMS) Ch Devika Rani and eight others for possessing huge unaccounted cash. Besides, they invested their ill-gotten gains in real estate on the names of benamis.
All the nine, including Devika Rani, were involved in corrupt practises, especially in generating fake medical indents, when she was director of IMS. Apart from Devika Rani, the arrested include former joint director of IMS, K Padma, former assistant director K Vasantha Indira, Omni Medi owner K Srihari, Omni Medi representative K Sujatha, K Krupa Sagar Reddy of Legend Enterprises, T Venkatesh, regional manager of Hemocue, B Venkateswarlu, and Ch Nagaraju, both employees of Omni Medi.
Rs 6 crore government funds diverted
ACB officials said that Omni Medi owner Srihari opened some shell companies for supplying medicines. He colluded with Devika Rani and others and diverted more than `6 crore government funds. Devika Rani allowed these shell companies to supply indents of medicines at higher prices to ESI (Employees State Insurance) hospitals by creating false records.
For allowing these shell companies to supply medicines, company managements paid mamools to IMS officials in cash, gold etc. The ACB recently unearthed cash of `4.4 crore from the possession of Devika Rani and pharmacist Naga Lakshmi. This is the second time that the ACB officials have arrested Devika Rani.