Nagpur, April 25
The Remdesivir injections recovered from the BJP croporators brother-in-law and his contractor partner were given by a nurse working with the district hospital in Gadchiroli. She had provided 12 Remdesivir injections a week ago, out of which seven Remdesivir were recovered by police, while five have been sold to a person from Delhi for one lakh rupees.
A serious questions has been raised about the safety of patients as for the first time a nurse from government hospital has been arrested in Remdesivir black marketing.
Lokmat Times had published a report on April 23 about black marketing of Remdesivir titled ‘Political leaders kin arrested for black marketing of Remdesivir’, after which the Beltarodi police arrested the BJP corporator’s brother-in-law Manoj Kamade on the night of April 23 along with Atul Walke, Prithviraj Mohite, Anil Kankani, Ashwin Sharma. The police also recovered `1.86 lakhs including five Remdesivir vials and `1 lakh cash.
Manoj Kamde and construction contractor Atul Walke are the main accused in the racket. Atul sold Remdesivir to Manoj. Manoj was selling them to the needy for `45,000 to `50,000. Atul was avoiding to reveal the name of the person who provided the Remdesivir,. but after police’s action, he confessed that nurse Pallavi Meshram posted in the Gadchiroli district hospital gave them the injection. Meshram was arrested on Sunday in Gadchiroli.
Pallavi Meshram is sister-in-law of Atul Walke. She is working as a nurse at Gadchiroli District Hospital from last seven-eight years. She has been deployed there on contract basis. She used to steal the Remdesivir issued in the name of the patients. She gave two boxes of Remdesivir containing six injections each to Atul Walke. Atul is denying that he paid any money to Pallavi for those injections.
Due to Pallavi's arrest it has been speculated that black marketing is going in in government hospital in rural areas. Police suspect that many health workers are involved in the theft of Remdesivir on the lines of Meshram. These hospitals are not monitored by top officials, police or administration. Poor patients or their family members are not aware of all these conspiracy.