Probe into illegal kidney transplantation expanded to other Punjab cities

Arrested doctors, facilitators remanded in FIA custody

LAHORE: The FIA has expanded the scope of its investigation into kidney transplant case to other cities, Deputy Director Jamil Ahmed Mayo told The News on Monday.

The FIA official said record of alleged illegal human organ transplant in other cities was being collected to nab the organised racket of doctors and their facilitators. He said after the raid in EME Society the other day where two doctors Dr Fawad Mumtaz (a surgeon at Lahore General Hospital) and Dr Altamash Kheral (General Secretary Young Doctors Association) and their alleged facilitators were arrested, more people approached the FIA for action against all the accused doctors involved in this inhuman act.

Parents of one Kashif, who died in 2013 due to alleged illegal kidney transplant, have submitted an application seeking registration of an FIR against Dr Fawad who had done the operation which caused the death of their 19-year-old boy, the FIA official said.

Separately, he said, the FIA has arrested two more foreigners from a hotel in Gulberg area who were due to undergo organ transplantation within the next couple of days.To a question, the deputy director said they have started a probe into the assets of the arrested doctors as well. He said the Punjab Health Department has been extending its full cooperation to the FIA in the probe against doctors and their facilitators.

According to him, so far they have come to know that these accused doctors have their clients even from America, Yemen, Palestine and Middle East. These doctors, he said, had been involved in the illegal business of human organ transplantation for the last several years.

This is the first case the Lahore FIA registered against two doctors, two foreigners and two organ donors under the Human Organ Transplant Act (HOTA) after Interior Minister Ch Nisar put the act on the agency’s schedule a month back.

Responding to another query, Jamil said special teams have been constituted to arrest agents and other suspects involved in the illegal business.It may be relevant to mention here that on a tip-off, FIA officials along with other law enforcement personnel on Saturday night raided a house in Lahore’s EME and found an illegal kidney transplant in progress.

The FIA officials claimed that the accused doctors with the help of middlemen used to arrange for the provision of kidneys by exploiting the poor by purchasing their kidneys at a low price and selling them to foreigners for exorbitant amounts in dollars.

The gang has already undertaken several illegal kidney transplants in the past by setting up small operation theatres in rented houses in posh localities, the FIA officials added.Meanwhile, a court Monday handed over the arrested doctors and their accused facilitators to FIA for a four-day physical remand for further investigation.