The special police team, which is on the trail of kidney racketeers in Dharmapuri, Salem, Namakkal, Erode and Coimbatore districts, on Wednesday, arrested one more person from Erode.
Based on the information revealed by the kingpin of the racket, Ayyavu, the police arrested Sigamani (50), a labourer from Erode. He is the sixth person to be arrested in the case. The police team also secured two women brokers who were involved in the racket in Salem and quizzed them at a place in Dharmapuri. During the interrogation, the police team gathered clues about various places in Dharmapuri, Salem and Erode, where the donors and receivers used to meet. A police team has rushed to Erode and Salem to collect more material evidences, sources said. Police have also searched Papparappatti, Thirumalvadi and surrounding villages to trace clinics run by quacks.
Meanwhile, the police suspect the role of a hospital in Western TN, which is involved in carrying out the transplantation. “ The initial inquiry with the accused and complainant revealed that the hospital might have a bigger role,” a senior police officer told Express.
The inquiry further revealed that many transplantations were carried out after it passed through the authorisation committee for approval of cases for renal transplantation. This shows that the committee has failed to have a thorough look at the document produced during the meet, the officer said. “The documents confiscated were used for establishing the relationship between the donor and receiver. Some documents are fake while others are sourced through government offices,” he said. “We are trying to know how they sourced the document and are trying to catch the people involved in it,” he added.
Asra Garg, SP, Dharmapuri district, said, “Since the people involved in the case are spread across the western region, we would leave no stone unturned to get into the depth of the issue.” Many of the documents seized were forged to get the transplantation done and the team will ascertain their modus operandi in getting the documents, he said. The chairman and members of the authorisation committee for approval of renal transplantation cases in Coimbatore were silent on the issue.