The special investigation team (SIT), constituted to investigate the black marketing racket of pharmaceutical drugs and medicines, including those used in the treatment of Covid-19 and cancer, arrested a pharmacist and a supplier of medicines from Jhajjar on Saturday, taking the total number of arrests related to the case to 13 so far.
On Saturday, the five-member SIT conducted raids in Jhajjar and arrested a pharmacist named Naveen Sharma, and a medicines supplier named Deepak Sharma. The police said the accused men had sold over 7,100 prohibited injections and 12,000 tablets worth over ₹7 lakh to two Iraqi interpreters in Sector 57. The consignment, the police said, was supposed to be sent to Iraq and sold for a premium.
A police official, privy to the investigation, requesting anonymity, said, “During interrogation, the two Iraqi suspects, who were arrested from Sector 57, during the first raid, had disclosed the names of Naveen and Deepak. They had been in touch with the interpreters for over six months and had supplied the medicines and injections for a commission.”
After the racket was busted, they had escaped to Jhajjar, from where they were arrested, said the police. Naveen runs a medical store in South City-1 and Deepak is a supplier of pharmaceuticals in the city. So far, the police have arrested four Iraqi interpreters, six pharmacists, two wholesale distributors and a medicines supplier, who are allegedly a part of the racket.
The Iraqi interpreters were arrested on July 28, after conducting a raid in which the police had seized 48 vials of remdesivir, 55 strips of fabiflu and 18 packs of Lopikast ( drugs used to treat Covid-19) among other medicines. Since then, the police have followed a pattern of reverse tracking to uncover the nexus, with the probe widening to four cities — Delhi, Gurugram, Jaipur and Agra.
A week after the racket was busted, the police had arrested several pharmacists and medical store owners from Gurugram and Delhi. The probe had revealed that the pharmacists, in turn, had procured the medicines, including remdesivir, from wholesale medicine distributors in Agra and Jaipur. One of the wholesalers was a distributor of remdesivir.
The police have also written to the manufacturing company of the drug to get to the source and unearth the nexus. Earlier, the police had said that the role of some hospitals in Delhi was also under the scanner for facilitating the supply of drugs.
Police probe has revealed that the Iraqi interpreters had been smuggling medicines to Iraq for at least two years, and since the pandemic, they had started dealing primarily in drugs used to treat Covid-19 that were in short supply and were sold at exorbitant prices in Iraq. The suspects worked as translators for medical tourism patients at private hospitals and enlisted the patients or their attendants as conduits, asking them to carry the medicines in flights to Iraq, from where they would be collected by an agent.
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