MP hospital director, 3 others booked in fake Remdesivir case

Jabalpur: An FIR was registered against a director of a private hospital and three others on Monday in a case related to selling fake Remdesivir injections in Jabalpur city of Madhya Pradesh, police said.

Of the four, one accused has been arrested, while another is in custody of the Gujarat police in a separate case related to sale of fake Remdesivir vials, they said.

The FIR (first information report) has named City Hospital director Sarabjeet Singh Mokha and three others, all accused of being involved in selling fake Remdesivir injections in Jabalpur, Additional Superintendent of Police Rohit Kashwani said.

Remdesivir is an anti-viral drug widely used in treatment of COVID-19 and its demand has shot up dramatically during the second wave of the pandemic.

Devesh Chourasia, a worker at City Hospital who has been arrested, medicine supplier Sapan Jain and an unidentified person also figure in the FIR filed at the Omti Police station, he said.

Of these, medicine supplier Jain was arrested by the Gujarat police on May 7, Kashwani said.

Chourasia, during interrogation, revealed that fake injections sold in Jabalpur were procured from Indore, he said.

The fake Remdesivir selling racket in Jabalpur came to light last week.

Further investigation was on to trace the persons who supplied fake injections from Indore, the police officer said.

The case was registered against the four under IPC sections 274 (adulteration of drugs), 275 (sale of adulterated drugs), 308 (attempt to commit culpable homicide), 420 (cheating), 120-B (punishment for criminal conspiracy) and provisions of the Disaster Management Act and the Epidemic Diseases Act, the police said.

The Indore police said on Sunday that an inter-state gang supplied at least 1,200 spurious Remdesivir injections, which contained glucose water and salt, in Madhya Pradesh in the last one month.

These injections were sold as genuine Remdesivir at exorbitant rates, a probe has revealed.

The Gujarat police recently busted this racket in Surat and arrested six persons, including Jain, an Indore police official had said.