ED attaches over Rs 3 crore assets of ex-superintendent of Patna medical college

ED attached over Rs 3 crore assets of ex-superintendent of Patna medical college on Friday. The total value of the attached properties is Rs 3.14 crore.

New Delhi: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has attached assets worth over Rs 3 crore in a money-laundering probe against former Superintendent of Patna Medical College and Hospital O P Choudhary, the probe agency said on Friday.

The properties attached, as part of a provisional order issued under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), include plots and flats in Patna, Ghaziabad, Pune and Bengaluru, three four-wheelers and some balance in bank accounts, it said.

The total value of the attached properties is Rs 3.14 crore, the agency said.

The central agency said in a statement, that "medicines, chemicals, equipment and machines were purchased by the officials of Patna Medical College and Hospital (PMCH) during 2008-09 and 2009-10 from local vendors and commission agents contrary to guidelines prescribed for purchase of these items."

"The then superintendent (O P Choudhary), the then deputy superintendent and the concerned faculty head of PMCH at that time and others in connivance with the suppliers had purchased medicines, chemicals reagents, machines and equipment at a higher rate and in much higher quantity than the required quantity which resulted in a loss to the government exchequer," the ED alleged.

The agency had slapped criminal sections of the PMLA against Choudhary and others after studying a 2017 FIR of the special vigilance unit of Bihar on the matter.

PTI