New Delhi: Watching her father battle stage 4 cancer, she was desperate for help. Neeraj Chauhan, therefore, was an angel providing them with chemotherapy drugs at highly discounted rates. Like her, another woman, also with stage 4 cancer, was overjoyed to find help. But she died after consuming the discounted drugs. Chauhan, who was arrested by the Crime Branch, was in reality the black angel of death for many families who had no idea that they were being provided with spurious drugs.
Families of several victims discovered that they had purchased counterfeit cancer drugs from the gang, which was recently busted for producing and distributing fake medications to unsuspecting patients.
The woman and her 61-year-old father, natives of Assam, met Chauhan in 2022 when he was employed at a Gurgaon hospital. The woman told TOI that her father procured injections and medicines from Chauhan on several occasions, lured by the attractive discounts he offered. “It is unimaginable that someone can deceive cancer patients in this manner,” she said. According to her, Chauhan gave them tablets valued at Rs 28,000 for just Rs 6,000 and injections worth Rs 28,000 for Rs 21,000.
“My father was consuming the medication believing it to be genuine. I personally observed Neeraj and he never appeared suspicious,” the woman said. “We met him a few times and later began messaging him for medicines.”
The husband of another 34-year-old cancer-stricken woman tirelessly sought treatment for her in various states. In 2022, the woman, married to a trader from Bihar, was diagnosed with cancer and her husband brought her to Delhi for treatment of stage 4 cancer. As he was desperately putting resources together to give his wife the best medical care possible, one of the unscrupulous gang members approached him, offering vastly cheaper drugs. The trader spent Rs 2 lakh buying cancer medication from them.
However, his wife died during treatment. It was then that he learnt through news networks about the gang selling spurious drugs. He was shattered. While recounting the details of his ordeal to the cops, he broke down innumerable times.
Earlier this month, Delhi Police’s Crime Branch unearthed the massive racket of manufacture and sale of counterfeit cancer and chemotherapy drugs. Along with arresting 12 people, police also seized spurious medicines notionally worth Rs 4 crore bearing the labels of seven international and two Indian companies from a flat in west Delhi’s Moti Nagar. Empty vials, packaging material and machinery were also seized.
