MUMBAI: As many as 30 spurious cancer injections were sold over the past year by the woman arrested recently from Kalyan for running a fake drug ring.
“We are trying to trace the suppliers to find out the larger link in the case,” said Niket Kaushik, economic offences wing (EOW) chief and additional director-general of police. The crime branch control that is probing the case is a unit in the EOW.
Two Mumbai police teams are camping in New Delhi and Bihar to find out and nab those who had supplied the fake injections and tablets to the accused. Recently, an interstate gang peddling fake cancer drugs made in factories in Faridabad and Karnal in Haryana has been busted.
The 30 original Adcetris injections, made by a Japanese firm, would cost about Rs 1.7 crore at the rate of Rs 5.8 lakh each. Pooja Rana, 30, who was arrested late last month for running Prime Pharma, was selling them for Rs 1.1 lakh each.
“We have found that around 30 spurious injections were sold by Rana’s company,” said inspector Nitin Patil, who had led the CB control team that had arrested Rana. Investigators said they have contacted most of the patients who were sold the spurious injections. The police have recorded the statements of 15 witnesses so far.
At the time of Rana’s arrest, the police had seized seven Adcetris injections, originally valued at Rs 40.6 lakh, and two Iclusig tablets worth Rs 27 lakh. These would be sent to the Japanese company for examination.
During the probe, cops also seized 24 vials of Tocilizumab injections from Prime Pharma. The drug was running in short supply at one point as it was found to be helping in managing Covid. The food and drug administration has been given samples for investigation. “We want to know if the Tocilizumab is genuine,” said Patil.
The crackdown began after a representative of the Japanese manufacturer lodged a police complaint under the IPC and copyright Acts. Rana, who ran Prime Pharma from Kalyan and had employed two persons, is now at Byculla jail.