Foeticide cases: Health dept launches crackdown on illegal scanning centres, fake doctors

BENGALURU, MYSURU: Amid the cases of foeticide that have been uncovered in Bengaluru, Mysuru and Mandya over the last few weeks, the Health Department has launched a crackdown on quack doctors across the state.

The issue of foeticide and quacks had come up during the Belagavi winter session of the legislature with the opposition parties attacking the government.

According to data available with the Health Department, so far, 1,436 quacks have been identified in the 31 districts of the state. Along with the crackdown on the fake doctors, the officials are also raiding scanning centres to check for violation of the PC-PNDT Act.

Meanwhile, in Mysuru, 14 clinics were sealed on Saturday for functioning unauthorisedly in an operation led by the district deputy commissioner. The district task force also visited various nursing homes across the city and notices were issued to clinics which could not furnish all the requisite documents.

Health Minister Dinesh Gundurao held a meeting with health department and police officials on Saturday.

“Our officials conducted an operation and sealed the illegal scanning centre in Hoskote and similar action should be taken across the state. More awareness against female foeticide and more checks should be conducted by officials. We will need to adopt a multi-pronged approach and we will set up a task force to check fake doctors, fake or unlicenced hospitals. We are looking into whether the relevant laws have to be strengthened”, said Health Minister Dinesh Gundurao.

“We are taking action to prevent foeticide under the PC-PNDT Act and against fake doctors under the Karnataka Private Medical Establishment (KPME) Act. We have already booked over 1,400 fake doctors. We are working on a warfooting to tackle scanning centres and fake doctors under the two Acts. We will compile the reports after December 31. A quasi-judicial court will take action against the fake doctors, who are mostly found in border districts like Bidar and Kolar. The fake doctors, who don’t even have degrees, come from Andhra Pradesh to remote villages on two-wheelers and return”, said Vivek Dorai, Deputy Director of the Health Department.

Vivek Dorai, Deputy Director of the Health Department.

“The fake doctors usually act as agents in foeticide cases where radiologists, sonologists or gynaecologists are involved. In very rare cases, some technicians may be involved like in the Mandya jaggery unit case”, the official added.

Bidar has the highest number of fake doctors so far at 423, followed by Kolar (179), Belagavi (170), Kalaburagi (81) Shivamogga (74), Dharwad (70), Bengaluru city (67), Chamarajanagar (51) and Chikkaballapur (45), Mandya and Koppal (33 each) and Mysuru (2).