New Delhi: On Friday, the Enforcement Directorate searched the homes and offices of the top executives of five diagnostics companies in Uttarakhand in connection with a fake Covid-19 testing scam during the Kumbh Mela.
After the Uttarakhand Police filed a case, the Enforcement Directorate began investigating. During the Kumbh Mela, these labs were contracted by the Uttarakhand government to conduct rapid antigen tests and RT-PCR tests. They allegedly did not carry out the required number of tests, but made false entries for Covid testing and raised bogus bills.
According to the Enforcement Directorate, the labs used a single mobile number, address, and form for several people and inflated the number of Covid tests without ever testing anyone. The probe agency reports that some of the names in the Covid testing records have not even visited the Kumbh Mela. Due to false-negative results from these labs, Haridwar at that time showed a positivity rate of 0.18 percent, while the actual rate was 5.3 percent.
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The Enforcement Directorate said it has seized incriminating documents, fake bills, laptops, mobile phones and property records.
On Friday, the probe agency carried out raids at Novus Path Labs, DNA Labs, Max Corporate Services, Dr Lal Chandani Labs and Nalwa Laboratories. The probe agency also said that the homes of their top executives in Dehradun, Haridwar, Delhi, Noida and Hisar were searched. They have already received part payment of Rs 3.4 crore from the state government, the probe agency said in a statement.
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