LG SAXENA ORDERS CBI PROBE INTO 'SHADY’ TESTS AT MOHALLA CLINICS

Accused in these cases are notrelated to AAP butare govt officials

- ABHINANDAN MISHRA

Delhi Lieutenant Governor VK Saxena has recommended a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into the allegations of fake lab tests on ghost patients in mohalla clinics run by the Delhi government. It is alleged that “lakhs of tests” were done on ghost patients to help private labs in the city.

There are 526 such clinics that are known as Aam Aadmi Mohalla Clinics (AAMC) running in Delhi and the alleged scam has so far only been unearthed in 7 such AAMCs leading to speculations that similar corruption was taking place in hundreds of AAMCs.

It is pertinent to mention that the named accused in these cases are not related to Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) but government officials who were selected following the due process of recruitment.

Documents accessed by the Daily Guardian shows that the alleged scam start unravelling in August 2023 after it came to the notice of Department of Health and Family Welfare that some doctors and medical staff employed at Aam Aadmi Mohalla Clinic (AAMC) were resorting to unethical practices to mark their attendance fraudulently by using pre-recorded videos in the tablets provided to mark the attendance.

It was also uncovered that despite the doctors not being physically present in these clinics, medicines and lab tests were prescribed to patients by the support staff, who were neither authorised nor qualified to prescribe the medicines.

In September 2023, all these doctors and staff were de-empanelled and FIRS lodged against them.