5 Middlemen Arrested From Cuttack’s SCBMCH For Diverting Patients To Private Hospitals

Cuttack: Five middlemen have been arrested from the SCB Medical College and Hospital in Odisha’s Cuttack city for allegedly diverting patients to private diagnostic centres and nursing homes.

Police said the arrested middlemen, who mostly worked as ambulance drivers, were arrested by Mangalabag Police on Thursday.

The five accused have been identified as Trinath Nayak, Sk Mituna, Biswajit Parida, Abdul Khan and Balia.

They were allegedly persuading patients and their relatives to shift to private nursing homes as no beds were available in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) of SCB Medical College & Hospital.

Based on such allegations from patients, policemen in plain clothes kept a watch on them. They were nabbed by the police today and forwarded to court.

“The accused are mostly ambulance drivers for the namesake but work as dalals. They pick their victims (patients) from the casualty and outdoor departments of the SCB and persuade them and their relatives to shift to private nursing homes to get better health care instead of wasting their time standing in queues,” Cuttack Zone II ACP, Amitabh Mohapatra said.