Kamal Ghorui
Chandigarh: CBI registered a case in the multi-crore ECHS scam on Friday a day after raids at several hospitals and doctors’ residences in Tricity that stretched well into the night. Arrest of some prominent doctors isn’t ruled out, said an officer.The case was registered on the basis of the documents seized by CBI during the searches, said an officer. According to sources, the investigation team recovered fake lab reports and fraudulent bills for expensive medicines.CBI found that ordinary patients were shown as being kept in ICU and on ventilator. The same patient was shown admitted multiple times in different hospitals, while some patients had never been hospitalised though records said they were.A private agency used to provide patients to Tricity hospitals for treatment under ECHS scheme. It has become clear in preliminary probe itself that the fraud was being carried out on a large scale, said an officer. The agency recovered fake stamps, digital signatures and bills from a diagnostic centre in Sector 38. Two doctors associated with a private healthcare company have been questioned.Several private hospitals of Tricity have been brought under the scanner. The agency allegedly received commission for referring patients to these hospitals.The ECHS treatment fraud is spread across the entire North region, says CBI after examining records of patients from Punjab, Haryana, Himachal and Chandigarh. The agency is investigating if the patients for whose treatment the hospitals received payment were actually ailing at all.Most of the allegedly fraudulent test reports were prepared by editing older ones, said sources, adding that an employee working at the Sector 38 diagnostic centre has admitted to this. CBI has seized hard disks containing these reports. The agency is preparing records of all doctors who were allegedly involved, and the labs that prepared the reports.
