Pune doctor in Porsche row arrested in 2022 kidney racket case

PUNE: Pune police arrested on Wednesday night Dr Ajay Taware, the suspended head of Sassoon General Hospital's forensic science department, in the 2022 kidney transplant case at Ruby Hall Clinic after securing his custody from Yerawada Central Jail earlier the same evening, reports Vishwas Kothari & Asseem Shaikh.

On Thursday afternoon, investigating officer ACP Ganesh Ingale produced Taware before judicial magistrate first class (JMFC) SR Badve, who ordered the doctor remanded in police custody till June 2.

Taware, who was in jail since his arrest on May 27, 2024 as a co-accused in the blood sample swap case linked to the May 19, 2024 Porsche Taycan car crash, was the head of the Regional Authorisation Committee (RAC) for Organ Transplant as well as the Sassoon Authority Committee and was medical superintendent at the time when the transplant process took place and was completed at Ruby Hall Clinic.

"We arrested Taware based on a five-member state health department inquiry committee's report of May 2022 that has indicted him and four others in the RAC for misusing their position to aid kidney swap transplant based on bogus persons and forged documents. The department's then deputy director for the Nashik region, Dr Raghunath Bhoye, headed the inquiry panel," Ingale said.

Pune police commissioner Amitesh Kumar, when asked why it took so long (three years) for the police to arrest Taware in this case, said, "We undertook a review of the case again and post-consultation and study took the call to arrest him."

With inputs from Gitesh Shelke