NEW DELHI: The Anti-Corruption Branch (ACB) has arrested seven suppliers and manufacturers and three laboratory owners and pharmacists who were allegedly involved in the supply of sub-standard resources to six government hospitals in the national capital.
The accused were identified as Hemant Joshi, Rahul Chaurasiya, Kamal Deep Singh, Rajesh Malhotra, Shahid Chaudhary, Shekhar Sharma, Bipin Kumar Pathak, Arjinder Pal Singh, Kapil Makhija, and Harneet Singh Bindra. The ACB said that the connivance of doctors, officials, and storekeepers has also surfaced during their investigation.
Furnishing details, Joint Commissioner of Police (Head, ACB) Madhur Verma said that, in August, 2023, six teams of the vigilance wing of the Health & Family Welfare Department separately visited LBS, LNJPN, DDU, SGM, JSSH and GTB hospitals of the Delhi government and collected samples of different medical implements such as cotton bandages, infusion sets, rolled bandages, absorbent cotton IP, latex examination gloves, surgical rubber gloves, hand sanitizers, among others.
“These samples were sent to different government-approved labs. The majority of these samples were either found sub-standard or failed during testing,” the senior officer said.
Subsequently, six complaints were filed with the ACB for registration of an FIR against the concerned manufacturing firms and erring officials.
Accordingly, an FIR under section 7A of the Prevention of Corruption Act, with section 120 B of the IPC was registered by the ACB and an investigation was initiated.
Initial investigation into the irregularities indicated that different alleged firms and suppliers had provided the requisite items through the GeM (Government e-Marketplace) Portal. The items were supposed to be delivered with the desired certification from government-approved labs, vital factor for the sanctity of the items.
“14 firms connected with the supply in question and belonging to Delhi-NCR were inspected. Relevant documents containing supply details were seized. The suppliers were questioned on relevant supplies,” the senior officer said.
He said that further investigation into the case revealed that government officials intentionally avoided taking the desired lab reports and licenses as mentioned in the GeM contract order. In some of the cases, license numbers mentioned by supplier belonged neither to him nor the manufacturer.
In most of the cases, batch numbers of delivered items did not match with those quoted by the manufacturer.
“It has also surfaced that sub-standard material purchased from local markets with no parameters at all was supplied to the hospitals. Receipts for items was also given by the concerned officials against nil delivery or short delivery. Instances have been noticed where the approval committee had issued approval even before receiving the material,” the official said, adding that these officials and suppliers kept committing frauds even after the issue was taken up for investigation.
‘Govt officers facilitated fradulent actions’
Investigation revealed that government officials intentionally avoided clarifying lab reports and license details of the suppliers, with receipts for items given by the concerned officials against nil delivery or short delivery, the ACB said, adding that these officials and suppliers kept committing frauds even after the issue was taken up for investigation.