Probe on to find how a pvt agency bagged contract for Covid tests at Mahakumbh

Police formed a special investigation team (SIT) on Friday to probe allegations of 100,000 fake Covid-19 tests conducted during the Mahakumbh in April as investigators focused on how an unknown private agency secured the contract during the high-profile event.

Haridwar senior superintendent of police (SSP) Senthil Avoodai K Raj said in an order that the seven-member SIT was formed to speed up the ongoing probe into the private agency, Max Corporate Services, and two private labs, Delhi-based Lalchandani Labs and Hisar-based Nalwa labs. Two other probes, one by the Kumbh Mela administration and another by district administration, are already on.

“The special team was formed to assist and ensure speedy investigation of the cases lodged in fake Covid testing,” said Ashok Kumar, Uttarakhand director general of police. The SIT asked people to come forward with any information of fake tests.

The development came on a day Max Corporate Services – a Noida-based private firm unrelated to Max Healthcare Group – moved the Uttarakhand high court against the FIR lodged in Haridwar’s Kotwali police station, arguing that it was a service provider that contracted other labs for conducting the tests.

Investigators are now probing how a relatively unknown agency bagged the lucrative test contract. Max Corporate Services was initially rejected by the district health administration because it was not recognised by Indian Council for Medical Research (ICMR) but was later chosen by the Kumbh Mela health administration after it sub-contracted two ICMR-recognised labs for testing.

In late March, Max Corporate Services signed memorandums of understanding with Lalchandani Lab and Nalva Labs. On paper, the two labs conducted roughly 123,000 Covid-19 tests, of which about 118,000 were rapid antigen tests and 5,000 were RT-PCR, said the investigators.

For the last two days, investigators have questioned Kumbh Mela health officer Dr AS Sengar. “The mela health administration probably didn’t carry out verification of the labs which resulted in them easily carrying out fake tests. Even those who collected samples are now under the scanner,” said an investigator on condition of anonymity.

Sengar previously said that the mela administration was committed to probing the allegations and have set up an internal investigation. “From fake testing, fake sample collectors to fake phone numbers all aspects are being probed. We have to wait for the final probe report as and when it’s submitted,” said Haridwar chief medical officer Shambhu Kumar Jha.

The Kumbh mela was curtailed this year but devotees thronged Haridwar for months despite experts saying the crowds and rampant violation of Covid protocol could spark a surge in infections. Roughly 9.1 million pilgrims took the holy dip in the Ganga from January 14 to April 27. The bulk of this — at least six million people — congregated in April, coinciding with the worst surge in the second wave of the pandemic.

Allegations of fake testing surfaced last week after a Faridkot resident complained to the authorities that he received a message for collecting his Covid-19 report despite never having been tested. The complaint triggered a probe that unearthed roughly 100,000 fake rapid antigen tests.

Real-time data checking through the ICMR portal revealed fake entries on basis of mobile numbers and addresses of people who were never tested. On contacting such people, many said they had not even visited Haridwar in April.

On Thursday, the three labs were booked for negligence, spreading disease, cheating and criminal conspiracy, and under sections of the 2005 Disaster Management Act and the 1897 Epidemic Diseases Act.

Lalchandani Labs and Nalwa Labs both denied the allegations. Max Corporate Services was unavailable for a comment.

But on Friday, Max Corporate Services approached the Uttarakhand high court seeking protection against police action and arguing that it contracted nationally accredited laboratories for testing during the Mahakumbh and was only a service provider.

“If any fake testing has been done, Max Corporate Services has no role to play and in fact is willing to unearth if any such thing has happened”, said the firm’s lawyer, Kartikey Hari Gupta.