Centre directs CVC to probe financial irregularities by Venugopal

New Delhi, Jan 9 (UNI) The Delhi Police has submitted before a Delhi Court that the alleged irregularities in collection of funds to the tune of about Rs 45 crore from the patients by the AIIMS Director P Venugopal has been referred to the Central Vigilance Commission(CVC).

In an application, Delhi Police Joint Commissioner Ranjit Narayan said the matter had been referred by the Union Health Ministry to the CVC for further probe.

''Inquiry conducted by the Union Health Ministry indicates that some of the AIIMS officials allegedly had committed financial irregularities, which contravened various sections of the AIIMS Act,'' said the application submitted before the court of Metropolitan Magistrate Chander Shekhar.

The Metropolitan Magistrate had directed the Delhi Police in September 2005 to register an FIR and conduct a vigilance probe for alleged financial irregularities against Dr Venugopal, Senior Financial Advisor Mayank Sharma, Deputy Medical Superintendent Arti Viz and the AIIMS.

But till date, the Delhi Police had not registered a criminal complaint against the respondents. The Police had referred the matter to the Union Health Ministry.

Abdul Mabood of Greater Kailash in South Delhi had filed a petition in the District Court seeking direction of a vigilance probe against the respondents for allegedly collecting excess funds from the patients and depositing them in another account in contravention of the AIIMS Act.

''For about 10 years, the Cardio-Thorasic (CT) Centre and Neuro-Science(NS) Centre had been collecting fees from patients in advance for various procedures such as angiography, angioplasty, by-pass surgery and brain surgery,'' said the petition.

The money was deposited by the patients in the ''CT patient account'' and ''NS Patient Account'' instead of the AIIMS Account.

After expenditure, about Rs 45 crore had been left in the account, which should have been returned to the patients, said the petitioner.

In a probe it was found that the AIIMS had not only overcharged the patients, as it was not supposed to levy service charge, but also making a profit out of patients' money by putting it in fixed deposit(FDR) etc, which was not permissible.

UNI