Bengaluru: BJP MLA's Aide Charged in Covid Hospital Bed-blocking Scam

Bengaluru: The CCB has filed a charge sheet against three people in connection with the Covid hospital bed blocking scam, including a man who is said to be a close aide of the BJP's Bommanahalli MLA, M Satish Reddy. CCB inspector Sridhar Poojara and his team presented the 250-page charge sheet to the first ACMM court here.

In late May, Babu, the MLA's "aide" was arrested. The MLA, along with fellow legislators and MP L S Tejasvi Surya, had just days earlier "exposed" the bed allocation scam.

Reddy released a viral video of the lawmakers' raid on the BBMP's South Zone Covid war room, in which he demanded answers from the officials on why hospital beds were not available to ordinary citizens.

Reddy and his supporters were also seen heckling a BBMP official who had ordered Babu's expulsion from the war room in another video.

According to a CCB source, Babu, a Begur resident named Netravati, and her friend Rohit Kumar was behind the scam. They've all been arrested and charged.

"The accused blocked the beds reserved (under the BBMP quota) in private hospitals and then sold them. The charge sheet lists the evidence provided by 40 people besides bank transaction details," the source said.

According to a source, Netravati and Kumar used social media to advertise Covid's hospital beds. Citizens' calls were answered by Netravati. As per the source, she would ask Babu to get the bed.

She received Rs 80,000 from one person, Rs 25,000 from another, and Rs 50,000 from the third, all of which she transferred to Babu using Google Pay and PhonePe. For their efforts, Netravati and Kumar were paid a commission.

"All this has been explained in the charge sheet," the source added.

When the scam was discovered, the accused were in the process of selling the bed to another patient, according to the source, who also stated that the statement of the fourth person (the patient) was included in the charge sheet.