The Delhi Police have turned a blind eye to complaints against 300 doctors with fake degrees, putting the lives of unsuspecting patients at risk.

This is despite the fact that the complaints have been made by the Delhi Medical Council, a regulatory body for registered doctors and medical education in the state.

While the police acted swiftly against Delhi’s former law minister Jitender Singh Tomar for allegedly using fake degrees to enrol as an advocate, these 300 masqueraders treating patients without certified degrees have been virtually let off the hook.

The Delhi Police failed to act on 300 complaints about quack doctors made by the Delhi Medical Council, a regulatory body for registered doctors. (Picture for representation.)

The Delhi Medical Council has, between 2012 and 2015, asked the police to register cases against 422 people, who are proven quacks and cannot practice allopathy. In about 300 cases, however, police have not even lodged first information reports (FIRs).

“These 422 people are not registered with the Delhi Medical Council or any other state council… and they don’t have valid degrees to treat people. These quacks are putting the lives of thousands of people in danger. The police should have taken immediate action against them,” Dr Girish Tyagi, registrar, DMC, told Mail Today.

Letter to cops

The medical council last week shot off a letter to Delhi Police Commissioner BS Bassi, requesting him to convene a meeting with the medical council representatives over the pending complaints.

“The police need to pull up their socks. The matter is extremely serious. Every year, a large number of people are cheated by these uncertified medical practitioners. We will discuss these issues and request the police to take action at the earliest against these quacks,” Dr Tyagi said.

As per the Delhi Medical Council officials, there are at least 2 lakh quacks in the country, of which nearly 50,000 are in Delhi alone. Most of these quacks have been discovered in north and west Delhi.

The Medical Council of India has registered at least 50 FIRs against fake medical degrees across the country.

Officials allege that due to the lax attitude of law enforcement agencies and no examples of stringent punishment against quacks, there has been a steady rise in the number of phoneys practising as qualified doctors in the Capital.

Complaint

Recently, a complaint against three fake doctors operating from the New Delhi district was received by the Public Grievances Department of Delhi government.

With the intervention of the city government, the case was solved in just 72 hours. Even after the Delhi High Court had instructed the city police to keep track of the large number of fake doctors operating from various parts of the Capital, the police seem to have turned a blind eye to the issue.

On May 29, 2014, the Delhi High Court had ruled that at least one raid should be conducted in each of the 11 districts in the city each month. The court, before passing the judgment, had asked the police and Delhi government to form guidelines against the quacks masquerading as doctors.

The fresh guidelines state that if the council receives a complaint, it must complete the doctor’s verification process within 72 hours.

For its part, the Delhi Police claimed that it abides by laid down procedures of law.

“We must have given reasons to the medical council for not registering an FIR. We follow a proper procedure. In many cases, the council might feel the need for an FIR, but our rules and opinion may be different,” Delhi Police spokesperson Rajan Bhagat told Mail Today.

As per the process, if any person reports a matter to DMC, the council issues a show-cause notice to the doctor concerned. If he is found guilty, a council registers a complaint with the police. Thereafter, the police have to register an FIR, after which the matter is taken to court.