Police bust organ harvesters

KOLKATA: Indian police have charged the suspected ringleader of an organ trafficking network, who is accused of luring poor people to one of Delhi’s top hospitals to have one of their their kidneys removed and sold, a police official said this week.

T Rajkumar Rao was arrested after being traced to a house on the outskirts of Kolkata, where he lived with his wife and infant son.

A police official said Rao was charged with various offences, including the removal of human organs without authority, the commercial sale of organs, cheating and dishonesty, forgery and criminal conspiracy.

Police bust the illegal organ harvesting racket operating out of Delhi’s Indraprastha Apollo Hospital, arresting five people, including two assistants to a doctor.

Rao and his accomplices were identified as suspected members of a gang operating in India and neighbouring states, police said. Nine arrests have been made now. The traffickers are accused of convincing poor people to sell their kidneys for an average of 300 000 rupees (R67 237) and reselling the organs on the black market at a huge profit, police said.

Fake identification documents were used to fool hospital officials into believing the victims were relatives of recipients. – Reuters