New Delhi: A 34-year-old doctor — an MD physician from Russia — was arrested from South Delhi for giving out fake COVID-19 test reports to at least about 75 people. Police said that he wanted to earn money to pay off his loan, adding that the fraudster
was caught after one of his victims noticed a spelling error in her report.
The Delhi Police said that the doctor, Kush Parashar was contacted by a person who provides nursing staff to patients. Parashar was asked to conduct COVID-19 tests of two nurses who were set to resume their duties with a patient but instead of testing the samples, he allegedly forged a test report and sent it to the concerned nurse on WhatsApp in PDF format.
However, when the nurse noted a spelling error in her name, she contacted the diagnostic lab under whose purported letterhead the report was issued only to find that they had no record of her sample ever being tested, DCP (South) Atul Kumar Thakur said, adding that police zeroed-in on the doctor and his accomplices and arrested them in South Delhi.
Police here claimed that Parashar often recommended patients for Coronavirus tests and would either collect the samples himself or get one of his assistants to do it and with the help of co-accused Amit Singh used to forge the test report on the letterhead of the diagnostic lab desired by the patient, without ever bothering to conduct the tests. The collected samples would be destroyed, police said.
Parashar admitted that he had forged COVID-19 test reports for over 75 people of many diagnostic centres such as CRL Diagnostics Lab, Modern Diagnostics & Research Centre, Dr P Bhasin Pathlabs (P) Ltd. and Prognosis Laboratories.
Officials said that Parashar's wife was pregnant and he needed money to pay his loans. They added that he charged Rs 2,400 for each test and would decide on a positive or negative result simply based on whether the patient was displaying symptoms.