Hyderabad: In the last week of March, 2014, a youngster from Hyderabad’s Kishan Bagh discreetly flew to Sri Lanka along with three others. Dinesh Maroo (26) had made a deal with a Sri Lankan doctor named Monik to sell his kidney for a few lakh rupees. He had not told his family about his journey. Five days after he left Hyderabad, Sri Lankan enforcement officials called up his family and informed that Dinesh had died under suspicious circumstances.
His death led to a police investigation in the city, which unearthed a organ racket active in India and Sri Lanka. However, apart from arresting a few agents, police could not touch the kingpins of the racket, who allegedly are still running it in Sri Lanka. “The police case has now hit a dead end,” said Dinesh’s brother Mr Ganesh, who has been striving to take forward the case by repeatedly approaching authorities including the central ministry of Home Affairs and top cops in Telangana.
“The police couldn't reach the main accused doctor yet because he is in Sri Lanka. Cops told me the MHA sent back their application to alert Interpol because of technical errors. It’s been more than a year now and the case is stuck, while the suspects are still running the racket.”
Police officials who are investigating the case said that the MHA sought a “Letter Rogatory” from a city court to pursue the case. “The letter is yet to be forwarded to MHA. The process is going on,” an official from Central Crime Station said.
Mr Ganesh, meanwhile asked why there was an inordinate delay in sending a court letter to the MHA. “More and more people from India will fall prey to this kidney racket if the authorities do not pursue these kingpins,” he said. The police had added the name of Dr Monik, the gang leader, in the First Information Report, and as per the investigation procedure, he has to be “brought to Hyderabad from Colombo for interrogation”.
Nobody, not even the investigation officials, are sure how Dinesh died in Sri Lanka. The hospital in Colombo where the autopsy was done is yet to give the post-mortem report to the Hyderabad police. The unofficial explanation given by the hospital authorities was that Dinesh died of a heart attack. However, no proof has been submitted to support the claim.
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