Delhi Police set to ask medical body to cancel licence of Tughlaqabad Extn clinic

Police said a fake surgeon arrested three weeks ago — who posed as a doctor but was only a Class 12 graduate — owns the Tughlaqabad Extension hospital.

Three weeks after the Delhi Police arrested the proprietor of a south Delhi medical centre and his three employees over allegations of death by negligence, investigation revealed that one of his employees — who posed as a doctor but was only a Class 12 graduate — owns a hospital in Tughlaqabad Extension.

New Ganga Hospital in Tughlaqabad Extension. (HT Photo)

A senior police officer, who did asked not to be named, told HT: “Mahender Singh, who was arrested in the case of Agarwal Medical Centre in Greater Kailash-I owns the New Ganga hospital in Tughlaqabad Extension. He had sought a medical licence from the Delhi Medical Council (DMC) in the name of a doctor who is an ex-serviceman.”

A second investigator told HT that Singh had allegedly hidden an instrument, which was used to perform a laparoscopy on a patient at the GK-I hospital, at the New Ganga hospital. “Singh had performed a laparoscopy on a patient, Asgar Ali, in 2022 at the GK-I hospital, who died. So, Singh hid the instrument at the hospital he owns,” said the second investigator.

The Delhi Police is now in the process of writing to DMC about cancelling the licence of the New Ganga hospital.

“We have found that the hospital was not running in accordance with the license it has and we are writing to the Delhi Medical Council to cancel the registration,” Deputy commissioner of police (south) Chandan Chowdhary said.

According to first investigator, New Ganga hospital is a two-storey building with at least one doctor deployed there at all times. “Singh used to call doctors as and when the need arose. We are aware that Singh, who is not a qualified doctor, has performed surgeries there. We are yet to ascertain if surgeries by other doctors or those pretending to be doctors too were done there,” said the second investigator.

This officer said that the south Delhi district police has not received any complaints against New Ganga hospital, which falls under the jurisdiction of the Govindpuri police station in the southeast police district.

Calls for a comment to the numbers provided by the hospital on its website went unanswered.

Police said that Singh was running New Ganga hospital since 2013. “The latest DMC license we have recovered is from 2023 to 2026, and is in the name of a retired army major,” said the second officer.

Police said that the hospital had a license to install three beds but had in fact over 15 beds. “In the complaint, we will convey to the DMC that Singh was arrested in the Agarwal Medical Centre case, and that the medical license of this hospital should be cancelled,” said the first investigator.

Singh was arrested on November 14, along with proprietor of Agarwal Medical Centre, Dr Neeraj Agarwal, his wife Pooja Agarwal, and another employee, Dr Jaspreet Singh.

Singh and Pooja are Class 12 graduates, who donned the white coat and performed numerous surgeries including surgeries for removal of gall bladder stone, child birth and abortion. Dr Neeraj, a general physician, too performed surgeries even though he was not qualified to do so. Dr Jaspreet, meanwhile, is accused of allegedly making fake surgery notes.

Police are investigating at least 17 complaints against the centre and Agarwal, of which in at least 15, people have died.