Sangli scam: How did Covid-19 hospital with no trained staffers get municipal nod?

After busting a fake Covid19 hospital last week the Sangli police are now probing if local municipal authorities were complicit in the case that involves the deaths of 87 Covid19 patients The police arrested cosmetic surgeon Dr Mahesh Jadhav owner of Apexcare hospital who hired homoeopathy and ayurveda students to treat Covid19 patients and charged exorbitant amounts for no treatmentDikshit Gedam SP SangliApart from inflating bills the hospital never allowed patients admitted to the general ward to bring their mobile phones and deprived them of provisions brought by their familyDr Jadhav is in police custody till July 25 Mahatma Gandhi police station incharge Sashikant Chavan said ldquoDr Jadhav offered a 30 per cent cut to ambulance services to bring patients to the hospital Most of the patients were residents of the nearby SolapurrdquoSources said that the hospital secured municipal permissions to operate as a Covid19 hospital on April 15 this year It operated as one for three months during the first wave tooSuperintendent of Police Dikshit Gedam said that of the 207 patients admitted to the hospital in the second wave 87 died ldquoThe death rate of this hospital is 43 per cent We had been getting complaints of inflated bills The hospital was flouting all Covid19 norms So we registered a case for disobeying a government servantrsquos order and cheating but during investigation we learnt that the hospital followed no rules There was no MDlevel medical practitioner only BHMS Bachelor of Homeopathic Medicine and Surgery students assisted him They are not competent to treat Covid19rdquo Gedam said adding that later Section 304 2 punishment for culpable homicide not amounting to murder of the IPC was invokedDr Mahesh Jadhav owner of the hospitalldquoWe had laid traps for Dr Jadhav as we knew he would try to flee from Sangli His Mercedes was stopped at one such checkpoint He was found to be using a fake number platerdquo Gedam saidA source at the hospital said ldquoMost of the patients died within two days of their admission Since bodies were not handed over to the relatives we suspect that the hospital may have removed body partsrdquoThe police are probing how Dr Jadhav got permission to run the hospital despite serious lapses Gedam said ldquoWe have kept our investigation wide and are probing through all the angles including organ smuggling but so far we have no received such complaints or leadsrdquoSecond case against docBefore Dr Jadhav six people from the hospitalrsquos management identified as managers Prasanna Karanjkar 36 and Narendra Jadhav 29 assistants Bharat Velhal 24 Gokul Rathod helper Balu alias Janki Ram Maruti Sawant 29 and Rajendra Dhage 34 were arrestedSubinspector Somnath Kachare said ldquoThis is the second case against Dr Jadhav In 2019 he and Rathod were booked for medical negligencerdquoKachare added that Rathod tried to destroy all evidence He spilt the beans during questioningldquoDhage ran a fake diagnostic centre where urine and blood samples were sent He would tamper with a doctorrsquos digital signature and make fake reportsrdquo Kachare addedldquoDr Jadhav ran a 50bed hospital with one ventilator None of the patients was given proper treatment they were charged for the ventilator to inflate billsrdquo Kachare saidKachare added that multiple patients came with an oxygen saturation level of 50 or 60 and despite knowing that they would need immediate critical care which it cannot provide the hospital admitted them ldquoThe hospital demanded Rs 20000 before admission and charged at least Rs 10000 per day We have recorded the statements of 25 people so farrdquo Kachare saidThe complainant in the case is medical officer of SangliMirajKupwad Municipal Corporation Dr Sunil Ambole Dr Ambole said that the technical committee of the district had conducted a survey before letting Apexcare treat Covid patientsThe Mercedes car in which Dr Mahesh Jadhav was fleeingldquoWhen the technical committee gives its okay in a report the file comes to the civic commissioner who gives his permissionrdquo said Dr Ambole adding that Apexcare did not cooperate in preauditing amid complaints of inflated bills ldquoAn officer was deputed for preaudit of bills but the administration did not cooperate despite several notices and reminders So the Collector and municipal were apprised of the situationrdquo said Dr AmboleRs 1 lakh in 10 daysMahendra Nirulkar had got his mother Vaishali admitted to the hospital on August 11 last year ldquoIn 10 days the hospital generated a bill of Rs 1 lakh Civic officials summoned the hospital after my complaint but they never turned up I kept following up and later they agreed to waive Rs 42000rdquo Nirulkar saidKajal Jadhavrsquos father Madhav died at the hospital ldquoWe had been sending coconut water milk eggs etc but it never reached him This is so cheap The bill was inflated Everything failed as my father did not surviverdquo said Kajal whose statement has been recorded by the policeDashrath Dongre admitted his father Madhav with high fever and cough ldquoAll hospitals were full Someone suggested I take my father to Apexcare We felt lucky that we got a bed but he did not survive Now we have learnt that the doctors were fakerdquo Dongre said207Total number of patients admitted to the hospital during the second wave87No of patients who died at the hospital4337Death rate of the hospital