Uttar Pradesh police’s special task force has arrested five members of a gang accused of running an illegal blood bank that had been selling adulterated blood at inflated rates in Lucknow for the past six months.
The five used to buy blood from professional donors, allegedly without mandatory tests, for Rs 300 to Rs 700 per unit, mix an equal quantity of saline water and sell it to patients for Rs 4,000 to Rs 6,000 a unit.
A majority of the donors were suspected to be drug addicts, police said.
Abhishek Singh, senior superintendent of police of the STF, said the five were arrested on Friday evening and sent to jail on Saturday after interrogation.
“Mohammad Nasim, the head of the gang, used to run the blood bank from his house in the Faizullaganj area of Lucknow. He was well-connected with many hospitals and used to supply spurious and contaminated blood,” Singh said.
The blood neither had registration nor a name.
Nasim’s aides have been identified as Rashid Ali and Honey Nigam of Lucknow and Raghvendra Pratap Singh and Pankaj Kumar Tripathi of adjoining Barabanki district.
“Mostly drug addicts were their regular donors. The blood racketeers used to loiter near hospitals, on the lookout for those whose relatives were admitted there. They had been running the racket for the past six months and had sold blood to over 1,000 people. Many patients might have died after receiving the unsafe blood,” Singh said.
The officer said the STF was enquiring with hospitals about possible deaths due to blood contamination in the past few months.
The gang did not allegedly conduct mandatory tests such as those for identifying the blood groups and possible infections such as HIV and hepatitis.
Dr Tulika Chandra, head of the blood transfusion department of King George’s Medical University, Lucknow, said such blood could prove fatal for patients.
“Patients who receive such blood are exposed to many diseases, including HIV, hepatitis, syphilis and sudden fall
in haemoglobin level,” she said.
According to rules set by the state government, a hospital or blood bank can sell each unit of blood for Rs 1,250. Blood sold after the nucleic acid test can cost Rs 2,000. But it is common knowledge that many private hospitals and blood banks sell blood at rates higher than those stipulated by the government.
P.K. Modi, the Lucknow division assistant commissioner of the Food Safety and Drug Administration, said the licences of two private hospitals — BNK and Medicine — in the Madiyahun area of Lucknow had been cancelled because they had allegedly been working in close coordination with the gang selling adulterated blood. Both hospitals have blood banks.
“It is a big racket in which doctors, hospitals and more people must be involved. An inquiry is in progress to identify all of them,” Modi said.
Police sources said the five arrested accused were involved in petty crimes in the past.
