Kidney Transplant Racket: Govt official approved fake documents without checks

The name of another government official from the Directorate of Health Services DHS has cropped up in the investigation of the second illegal transplant case in the Hiranandani Hospital kidney transplant racket Dr Shrikant Babhulgaonkar assistant director of DHS who was the government representative in the authorisation committee of the hospital allegedly approved fake documents in the case without proper checks This is in a case where even blood test reports were not matching between the donor and recipient The doctor said that he didnrsquot remember the caseDr Shrikant BabhulgaonkarSundar Singh Jadhav 23 the main witness in the case donated his kidney to recipient Dimple Manak Himmatramka under the fake documents of Sundarkumar Kunjbihari Roongata He posed as the brother of the recipient The authorisation committee of the hospital held a meeting on April 13 to grant approval to conduct the kidney transplantThe documents available with midday show that Sundarkumar claimed to donate his kidney to Dimple lsquoout of love and affection towards his sisterrsquo The fake documents submitted by Sundar showed that he was a resident of Thane and his age was given as 30 yearsNo match in reportsBefore any kidney transplant Human Leukocyte Antigen HLA test is conducted to check if the donorrsquos kidney is compatible with the recipient But in this case the HLA didnrsquot match which should have raised doubts about the relationship between themDocuments available with midday show that Dr Anurag Naik medical director of the hospital who is also the chairperson of the committee and Dr Babhulgaonkar assistant director of health service approved the kidney transplant of HimmatramkaldquoHLA doesnrsquot match However legal documents establish the brothersister relationshiprdquo is what Dr Naik had written on the approval paper of the authorisation committee Dr Babhulgaonkar also signed itWhen midday spoke to him Dr Babhulgaonkar said ldquoI have approved many organ transplantations so canrsquot remember about the details of the case I am busy canrsquot talk currentlyrdquoDr HL Trivedi who is one of the pioneers in kidney transplants in India and has won the Padmashree said ldquoIf an HLA report doesnrsquot match between donors and recipients then the hospital should opt for the blood test of the parents to confirm the relationship And if it is not possible then they should do a DNA test which is very expensive This helps in clearing any doubt in the transplantrdquoDHS will summon the official for questioning ldquoAs he is a government official we have to follow proper procedures of interrogationrdquo said a senior official from DHSThis will be the second case where a government official has been investigated in the kidney transplant racket Earlier another assistant director of DHS Dr BN Kadam had also been questionedHLA testThis Human Leukocyte Antigen test is done to match organ and tissue transplant recipients with compatible donors It identifies the HLA genes a person inherits from his parents and the corresponding antigens proteins in his cellsDr Tukaram Jamale Asst Professor Dept of Nephrology KEM said ldquoIf the donor and recipients are siblings then their HLA will match Rarely if there is a problem then it will match at least 25 per cent though it generally matches to around 50 per centrdquo