Chandigarh: CBI lodges FIR in ₹1.14-cr PGIMER patient welfare grant fraud

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) registered a case under the Prevention of Corruption Act over the alleged misappropriation of more than ₹1.14 crore from the patient welfare grant at the Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research (PGIMER).

Between 2017 and 2021, funds meant for the treatment of 103 poor patients were allegedly siphoned off to third parties and pharmaceutical companies. The total amount, ₹1,14,72,026, was allocated under central and state government health schemes, including the Prime Minister’s Office and Rashtriya Aarogya Nidhi. According to the FIR, the money was disbursed even in the names of deceased patients using forged documents and manipulated bills.

The case has been registered under Section 120-B (criminal conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), read with Sections 406 (criminal breach of trust), 409 (criminal breach of trust by a public servant), 420 (cheating), and 471 (using as genuine a forged document) of the IPC, along with various provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act.

The FIR follows a detailed CBI probe after irregularities came to light at PGIMER’s private grant cell, which was handed over to the agency earlier this year.

The alleged scam was first highlighted after an RTI filed by Ashwani Kumar Munjal, chairman of the joint action committee (JAC) of PGI contractual workers union, made public the internal probe report by professor Arun Kumar Aggarwal. The Aggarwal committee, constituted in February 2023, looked into the misappropriation of funds at the private grant cell and its report to PGIMER management in May 2024.

Munjal has questioned the committee’s neutrality, particularly regarding the appointment of private grant cell head Ranjit Singh Bhogal as its convener.