Hyderabad: Professor Chaturvedi Vasudev, vice-president, sales and international business of the Krishna Institute of Medical Sciences Hospital was taken into custody by Ugandan law enforcement authorities on allegations of human trafficking and irregularities in kidney transplantations.
Prof. Chaturvedi markets Kims’ services for kidney and liver transplantations in East African countries, particularly Uganda, and channels patients, including donors and recipients of organs to Kims at Hyderabad.
 
Mathias Kavuma, an Ugandan national who came to Hyderabad recently for a kidney transplant, spoke to this correspondent over phone from Uganda and said, “We have filed a national petition regarding the kidney transplantation. 
 
In another case, the professor by name of Chaturvedi Vasudev was arrested in Uganda as soon as he arrived at the Entebbe international airport.”
 
Kavuma said Prof. Chaturvedi is being charged with human trafficking and unauthorised kidney transplantation. “He was detained at the special investigations unit in Uganda for three days and released on police bond.
 
He claims he works for Kims at Hyderabad. He is an Indian national and he and other doctors in India and Uganda are involved in this,” Kavuma said.
 
He added the police is probing the matter to find out whether the boy’s family had consented to the kidney transplantation.
 

Kims deleted info on professor

Vanishing act: The image on the left shows a screenshot of the KIMS website which mentions Prof. Chaturvedi. The image on the right shows that his photo and information about him have been removed after DC contacted them.
 
Hyderabad:  When this newspaper contacted Professor Chaturvedi Vasudev, charged with human trafficking and unauthorised kidney transplantation, on his Indian phone number, it was set to roaming in Uganda. 
 
A Ugandan woman claiming to be his secretary took the call and said that Prof. Chaturvedi was arrested three days ago and released on bond. He was again picked up by local Ugandan police on Wednesday evening.
 
Kims MD M. Bhaskar Rao said the hospital had performed three cases of transplantation from Uganda. “We started overseas transplantations and medical tourism in the past six months,” he said. Bhaskar Rao said Prof. 
 
Chaturvedi was “not our paid employee, and he is only marketing for us in Uganda”. Each transplantation costs $7,000 and Prof. Chaturvedi gets commission case by case, he said.
 
 As regards his designation, Rao said, “We have appointed him technically as vice-president.” Interestingly, Kims changed its medical tourism webpage soon after this correspondent spoke to them and removed information regarding Dr Chaturvedi. Rao said, “We haven’t flouted any rules. 
 
The patients approach Ugandan doctors who in turn send them to their government. After the Ugandan government clears it, to they go to Indian High Commission for a visa. After securing a visa they come here.”
 
In Hyderabad, “Again the cases are sent to the State  Organ Transplantation Committee. After the approval of the committee which is headed by the director of medical education we take up the case,” Rao explained.
 
He added he had also called up the secretary of Prof. Chaturvedi who had confirmed that he  had been detained.  
“We don’t know under what charges. Unless he comes out and speaks, we will not able to say what happened,” he said and reiterated that in the three cases from Uganda handled by Kims, the donors and recipients are Ugandans. 
 
“We only do (transplantations) after all documents approved by Ugandan and AP governments,” he said.