NHRC seeks UP's response on forced kidney donor's plea

NHRC seeks UP's response on forced kidney donor's plea
UNITED NEWS OF INDIA

NEW DELHI, FEBRUARY 23: The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) has asked the Uttar Pradesh and Punjab governments to file reports on a nearly two-year-old incident in which a Lucknow resident was cheated off his kidney during a medical examination.

Commission sources told UNI that though the state governments were directed to communicate their response by February 24, no reply has yet been received. If the reports were not received till that date, the Commission was likely to sent a reminder before deciding the future course of action. During a medical examination related to a promised job in 1998, one of the kidneys of Akram Raza were surgically removed in Jalandhar without the victim's consent. Akram approached the NHRC after he received threats from people who got his kidney removed, but the Commission refused to entertain the case in January saying that the incident was nearly two-years-old and under the policy, an incident which was more than a year old cannot be registered by it for investigation.

Recently, Chief of the Investigation Wing D R Karthikeyan decided to take up the matter as an exceptional case. Akram was given a hearing by NHRC. Akram and his family in Beharkala village of Bareilly district in Uttar Pradesh were threatened by the perpetrators of the crime and were asked to desist from pursuing the case. He alleged that not only he was threatened by his perpetrators, but was also asked by one of the officials of NHRC to settle the matter.

Interestingly, after Karthikeyan's intervention, the same officer, is stated to have, recorded the statement of Akram. Akram, who discontinued his studies after Standard I and started plying a rikhshaw in Lucknow, alleged that R C Gupta, who claimed to be Chief General Manager in the Telecommunications Department in Delhi offered him a job in Delhi. He was told that prior to his appointment, he would have to undergo a medical examination for which he was taken to Jalandhar where his kidney was alleged to have been removed and `donated' to Gupta's ailing wife Urmila Gupta.

Akram, somehow, managed to run away from Jalandhar and reached Lucknow where he brought the matter to the local police with the help of a doctor. Though the Lucknow police initiated the investigation, its efforts yielded little result. Akram and his family started receiving threats of life after the theatre group, Akram had joined, depicted the incidents which the victim underwent in its play Kasai. The play attracted huge public attention.