Raj govt likely to bring new policy for organ transplants

The state government is planning to bring a comprehensive organ transplant policy in the view of recent discoveries of illegal organ transplants within Rajasthan, people aware of the matter said.

This proposed initiative aims to establish stringent regulations to ensure transparency and accessibility for patients seeking organ transplants.

The development comes after the state health department found approximately 945 fake no-objection certificates including 269 for non-blood relatives issued last year across 15 authorised hospitals in the state, according to the excerpt of a report shared by the department on Wednesday.

State health minister Gajendra Singh Khinvsar said, “This is an extremely unusual incident that happened over the years. Apart from taking action against the people involved in the matter, the health department is working effortlessly to lay out a policy comprising a few recommendations that will make the application and execution process of organ transplantation easier and more transparent for the donors and recipients in Rajasthan.”

He further said the policy might come into force after receiving approval from chief minister Bhajan Lal Sharma following the lifting of the model code of conduct next month once the result of the ongoing general election is declared on

June 4.

An official familiar with the matter, however, said the department is primarily developing an online portal as part of that policy. “The portal will enable the donors and recipients to apply for the transplantation by attaching all the documents online instead of the existing physical application process. It will help the department and also the applicants to keep track of the status of their applications till it get cleared,” said the official.

At present, a patient (recipient) has to arrange a donor and submit a physical form with all the required documents to the concerned hospital where he is planning to undergo the surgery.

“This hospital has to be one of the 15 hospitals authorised to conduct such organ transplantation surgery. The hospital then has to send the application for consideration of the state-level authorisation committee that is housed in Jaipur’s Sawai Man Singh Hospital. Once their review is done, they will notify the hospital issuing the no-objection certificate and the names of the donor-recipient pair will also be listed on the NOTTO’s website,” said an official on condition of anonymity.

The officer also stated that the hospitals can also issue NOCs for the patients if the pair are relative. “However, an NOC from the SMS’s authorisation committee is mandatory if the pair is a nonblood relative or a foreigner,” he said.

He added that the new online system will reduce such manual paperwork.

“The donors and receivers will now be able to log in to that portal with their user ID and password whenever they want and it will show them the status of their applications. A third party from the department will also be able to keep an eye on each document making the process more transparent and democratic,” said the officer.

Earlier, health minister Khnivsar also announced that the department will constitute a three-tier system by unmerging the advisory-cum-state-level-authorisation committee which was formed in 2021 to issue the no-objection certificates for organ transplantation across Rajasthan.

“Merging the advisory committee and the authorisation committee was a sheer violation of the Transplantation of Human Organs and Tissues Act (THOTA) 1994. I have already discussed the matter with the CM. He has asked me to immediately unmerge this committee and form a three-tier system to ensure more transparency in the entire process of issuing NOC,” Khinvsar said.

The development comes in after an illegal organ transplantation racket was exposed. The racket is said to be active since 2021. According to police, the transplants were carried out without an official no objection certificate (NoC) from the hospitals.

The police have so far arrested 13 people in the case including two doctors of the Fortis Hospital, a nephrologist Dr Jitendra Goswami and a urologist Dr Sandeep Gupta, for their alleged involvement in the case.

The health dept is working to lay out a policy comprising a few suggestions that will make the process of organ transplantation easier in Rajasthan GAJENDRA KHINVSAR, Health minister