Four held, one detained in fake vaccination racket
In a major breakthrough, the Mumbai Police has busted the racket involved in a fake Covid-19 vaccination drive in the metropolis with the arrest of five persons in 72 hours.
The incident was reported from Hiranandani Heritage at the Kandivli-West area of the metropolis.
The Mumbai Police has also widened the check whether they did similarly duped people elsewhere.
Hiranandani Heritage Residents Welfare Association filed a complaint with the Kandivli police station on Wednesday.
The FIR was registered on Thursday.
The management committee of the building had arranged a vaccination drive for its residents and their in-house staff, including the security guards, drivers and domestic help, on 30 May.
The society has 435 flats, comprising three residential towers and around 390 residents were vaccinated during the drive.
The police have arrested Mahendra Kuldeep Singh (39) Sanjay Gupta (25) Chandan Singh (32) Karim Akber Ali (21) and Nitin More (32).
“So far we have picked up five people. While four of them have been arrested in Mumbai, we have detained one in a railway station in Madhya Pradesh and he is being brought to Mumbai,” Additional Commissioner of Police (North Region) Dilip Sawant said.
The residents said that a facilitator claimed to be a sales representative from Kokilaben Dhirubhai Ambani Hospital, negotiated with them for providing 400 vaccine doses on their society premises. The doses cost Rs 1,260 each and around Rs five lakh was paid to the facilitator.
The KDAH management denied that it conducted any such drive – and asked people to be careful.
The BrihanMumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) also ascertained that no such permission was given for the Hiranandani Heritage building.
“It is a major breakthrough for us and we are carrying out detailed investigations,” Sawant said, adding that three to four days after the vaccination was done, the residents started receiving certificates.
“However, there were mistakes in date, time and place (of vaccination). Few days after that, when they realized that they had been duped, they approached the police.
“We found that there was no permission by BMC for any vaccination drive in Hiranandani Heritage. Besides, no qualified doctor was present when the vaccination was conducted, which is mandatory,” he said.
Sawant also said that the accused have stolen identities of various hospitals. “The vaccine was not procured from any authorized source,” he said, adding that whether the vaccines were genuine or fake is being checked.
The accused persons have been booked under provisions of the Indian Penal Code and Information Technology Act.