Hafiz Muhammad Aziz-ur-Rehman
HAFIZABAD: The police have arrested Sajid an employee of DHQ Hospital Hafizabad who is also involved in the bone marrow/fluid extraction scandal. The police have already rounded up Muhammad Aslam Hunjra, his wife Amina Bibi, ring leader of the racket Nadeem Iqbal and Irfan. All the accused have been produced before the Judicial Magistrate who have remanded them to police custody for two days.
According to Medical Superintend DHQ Hospital Dr. Rehan Azhar, sixteen girls (identity withheld) affected have so far been traced and signs of injections were found on the different parts of their bodies and their samples have been sent to the Punjab Forensic Science Laboratory. It has also been decided that polygraphic test of ring leader of the imposters Nadeem Iqbal and Sajid would be conducted shortly.
A woman said that the accused were running their immoral and illegal activities and her daughter was also fallen in their prey and after the extraction of blood marrow/fluid from her body, she become too weak to walk. She further said that more than two hundred girls have been trapped by the swindlers. It may be mentioned that ring leader of the racket Nadeem Iqbal Ghaffari of Mohallah Sharifpura and other accused lured young poor and illiterate girls and advised them to visit the house of Muhammad Aslam Hunjra on Kassoki road where they had set up a so-called clinic for medical checkup. According to the complainant Sarfraz Ahmad, the accused also enticed him to send his daughter Kinza to the so-called clinic for medical checkup where the accused allegedly extracted bone marrow and some fluid from her backbone few days ago and also collected her picture and copy of CNIC for providing her Jahez Fund. Since then she fell ill and become weaker and weaker despite medical treatment.
Thereupon, the police raided the so-called clinic and arrested Muhammad Aslam Hunjra and his wife Amina Bibi and seized large quantity of syringes, copies of CNIC and pictures of scores of the affected girls. The other two members of the gang including ring leader Nadeem Iqbal and Irfan managed their escape. However, the police chased them and arrested them promptly. The main accused Nadeem Iqbal, who posed himself as an employee of DHQ Hospital, confessed that he had extracted bone marrow and other fluid from the backbones of fifteen girls so far and have sold them to one Sajid an employee of the Kidney Ward of the DHQ Hospital Hafizabad. Ring leader of the racket said that he used to sell the bone marrow/fluid to Sajid, an employee of the DHQ Hospital Hafizabad at Rs. 40,000/- which is clear proof that some greedy doctors must have been involved in the scandal.
Different surgeons gave different versions about the extraction of bone marrow/fluid and their transplants. One of them, when questioned, said that the bone marrow can be extracted from the backbone to transplant it for curing Aplaspic Anaemia and added that special syringes are used to extract the bone marrow/fluid. Moreover, an ordinary dispenser or quack cannot extract such things from the body of anyone, which means that the ring leader of the racket must have got training from an experienced surgeon.
Bone marrow is the spongy tissue inside some of the bones in the body, including the hip and thigh bones. Bone marrow contains immature cells, called stem cells. Many people with blood cancer, such as leukaemia and lymphoma, sickle cell anaemia and other life-threatening diseases, rely on bone marrow or cord transplant to survive.
Meanwhile, the five-member special committee headed by Deputy Commissioner Saleha Saeed to conduct thorough probe to ascertain the real facts has also started inquiry which would be finalized within next two days.
