Hospitals under government scanner

HYDERABAD: The move to empower GHMC to dispose bodies was taken after monitoring activities in the two institutes,

Osmania General Hospital

and

Gandhi Hospital

, for years.

Authorities say they suspect active involvement of 'mafia' carrying out illegal trafficking of human bodies. An RTI recently revealed that 117 patients, after being admitted as medico-legal cases from Osmania

General Hospital

and Gandhi Hospital between January 1, 2015 and August 15, 2016, have 'gone missing' or vanished. Sources suspect that a profitable market for selling dead bodies in various parts of the country is at play.

Founder of the

Satya Harishchandra Foundation Dr K Rajeshwar Rao

, who hinted at a possible racket, said the new rule will not deter miscreants. "Usually, we claim 3,500 per body, but the new government order reduces the amount to 700, which is not enough to pay the labourers, let alone the entire cremation process," he told TOI. Smuggling of cadavers is nothing new as first-year medicos in anatomy dissection classes at state-run and private medical colleges have to struggle to get a peek at how a body is dissected. With a single cadaver for a batch of 50 to 60 medicos, overcrowding and lack of donations have been hampering the quality of education in the state.