Karnataka - Belgaum   

Auto driver helps arrest four; blood supply racket busted in Belgaum

Belgaum: The police have arrested four persons for allegedly cheating gullible patients and exploiting physically handicapped persons at the District Government Hospital here on Friday.

Though people are aware of the existence of unscrupulous “agents” cheating poor patients needing blood and physically disabled persons who want to obtain certificates on their physical condition from the hospital authorities, an autorickshaw driver was instrumental in helping the police arrest the members of the gang headed by Hampannavar.

Around noon on Friday, Prakash Mardi learnt from his passenger, a woman that she had to arrange blood for one of her relatives undergoing treatment in the hospital.

The hospital authorities allegedly advised her to arrange blood from outside.

She was led to some agents who demanded from her Rs. 1,500 to Rs. 2,000 for half-a-litre of blood. Smelling a racket, Prakash Mari saw the “agents” standing in a corridor in the hospital and later approached three of the gang members with a request for blood.

Having confirmed and asking them to wait so that he could get the money, he returned with four autorickshaw drivers, Kalmesh Veerabhadraiah, secretary of Jai Karnataka Autorickshaw Drivers’s Okkuta, Basawaraj, Srikant and Vinod Talwar and caught the three agents.

Soon, they caught another and handed them over to the police. The agents were identified as Bharat A. Doddamani and Prakash Patil of Belgaum, Gopal Hiremath of Bailhongal and Sanjay Desai of Bagewadi.

They reportedly admitted that they had links with the hospital staff who tipped them about patients requiring blood.

Only on Thursday, the okkuta members had “gheraoed” the Residential Medical Officer for not initiating any action against the illegal agents exploiting poor patients.

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