In a fresh crackdown on the multi-billion National Rural Health Mission scam, the Central Bureau of Investigation on Friday carried out as many as 30 raids across five different cities in Uttar Pradesh.
While CBI investigators swooped on 25 places in Lucknow alone, five raids were carried out in Varanasi, Meerut, Ballia and Bahraich.
'The raids were essentially on establishments run by drug and medical equipment suppliers , besides some officials of the medial and health department," CBI Joint Director Javeed Ahmad told mediapersons.
"Resides and offices of Bahraich chief medical officer Dr Hari Prakash, Deputy Chief Medical officer Dr A K Srivastava, Gonda CMO Dr S P Pathak, and Gorakhpur CMO Dr Kanaihiya Lal were also raided by our teams," he said.
He however refused to divulge anything about the recoveries made from these places. According to Ahmad, "Four FIRs have been registered in connection with Friday's raids." However, no arrests have been made so far.
With eight FIRs having already been lodged in what is described as a Rs 8,000 crore scam, the total number of criminal cases registered has reached 12.
The large-scale bungling in the centrally funded programme involved not only heavy over-invoicing, but even fake supply of medicines and hospital equipment by fictitious firms as well as huge kickbacks in construction activity undertaken with a view to improving the available health services in government run primary health centres in the rural areas.
The scam had turned murky with the murder of two chief medical officers in Lucknow followed by systematic killing of a deputy chief medical officer well inside the premised of the high security Lucknow district jail,where he was holed up after his arrest.
Driven against the wall, two employees of the family welfare department dealing with NRHM files had taken the extreme step of ending their lives while another even made a suicide bid.
