Pratibha trip raises dust OUR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT Bhopal, June 29: Controversy has been Pratibha Patil’s companion during her four-day tour of Madhya Pradesh.
Yesterday, she left herself open to accusations of protocol breach when she made an unscheduled visit to brother Ranjit Singh Patil’s home in Ujjain.
But that, as local BJP and Congress leaders said, turned out to be the most inconsequential imprudence during her stay in the state.
She then went to Indore to inaugurate a private eye hospital, Choithram Netralaya, a subsidiary of Choithram Hospital Trust that is under the scanner for illegally removing patients’ kidneys and evading taxes.
The kidney racket, which involves an interstate gang spread across Chennai, Ahmedabad and Coimbatore, was busted on Friday, just before Pratibha’s visit, in Ujjain, around 50km from Indore town.
Ujjain police chief Manmeet Singh Narang said teams had been sent to Ahmedabad and Chennai but spoke only of “a hospital in Indore under the scanner”.
Choithram Hospital’s chief medical officer R. Mehta denied the allegations. “Our hospital is not involved. We believe in the highest standards of medical ethics.”
He acknowledged a complaint had been filed but said it “didn’t mean anything”.
Indore authorities claimed Choithram Trust, which runs several schools and hospitals, had also not paid taxes of Rs 2.28 crore. Collector Rakesh Shrivastava said the President’s office had been informed about the controversies.
