Fake remdesivir racket ‘main conspirator’ brought to Ahmedabad

Days after the Ahmedabad Police Detection of Crime Branch (DCB) arrested seven persons for allegedly selling duplicate remdesivir vials to needy patients in Ahmedabad, the alleged conspirator of the racket, Vivek Maheshwari, was brought from Vadodara jail to Ahmedabad on transfer warrant on Thursday.

According to police, on April 28, the DCB Ahmedabad arrested seven persons and seized as many as 133 duplicate vials of remdesivir which the accused were trying to sell in black market. Further investigation into the case revealed that the accused had purchased from pharmaceutical companies in bulk 2,880 injections of ceftriaxone sulbactam and 2,204 injections of piperacillin tazobactam (both antibiotics) after which the accused pasted duplicate stickers of pharmaceutical giants Jubliant (Jubi-R) and Hetero on the meds, trying to pass them off as remdesivir.

Police investigation also revealed that the accused group had already managed to sell off 1000 fake vials of remdesivir in the black market and cash worth Rs 21.04 lakh was recovered from them which they had procured by selling the fake drugs.

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In the entire fake drug racket, the alleged main conspirator turned out to be Vivek Maheshwari, owner of Maheshwari Pharmaceutical and Surgical company in Vadodara, who had issued the bills for procuring anti biotic drugs. He was arrested by Vadodara DCB on April 27 in a similar racket.

“The accused Vivek Maheshwari was also a wanted accused in our case. We had sought a transfer warrant for him and he has been brought today in Ahmedabad and arrested officially after a protocol covid test. Further investigation is on in the case,” said an official of Ahmedabad DCB.