Touts make a killing at Rims by promising prompt services

Ranchi: Under the garb of providing assistance in admission and other medical facilities, several patients at the state-run Rajendra Insitute of Medical Sciences (Rims) are being duped of thousands of rupees by touts.
The touts reportedly promise to get the pathological tests done quickly for a fee and arrange for a bed even if the hospital staff refuse them. They even charge money to fix up appointments with the doctors when such services are free of cost. They even charge the patients for arranging for medicines and blood bottles.
Two of such instances came to light on Friday when patients Manju Devi and Dharam Mahato claimed that a man named Ajay took cash and other valuables from them under the pretext of helping them get treatment at the state’s only superspecialty hospital.
Recalling the ordeal, Manju’s husband Gopal Pandit said, “My wife is a cancer patient and I had come to the hospital on August 18 to get her treated at the oncology department. But after several attempts of getting her treated failed, I was waiting near the central emergency one day when a man approached me and said he can help me in arranging the necessary treatment for my wife. He also assured me of getting the pathological tests done in exchange for Rs 500. Accordingly, once the preliminary tests were done, we returned home on August 28. When we returned to Rims on September 3, he said that I have to pay him Rs 7,500 as doctor’s fee and for the tests that my wife underwent during our last visit. He also asked for Rs 2,500 to arrange for blood and other medicines.”
Dharam Mahato, a 70-year-old man who came to Rims to consult a doctor for his eye disease, was allegedly duped of Rs 2,500 by the tout who promised to get him the right doctor’s appointment in a jiffy. “I had been visiting the hospital for over a month but was unable to get hold of the right doctors. The tout met me near the OPD complex and took Rs 2,500 in three instalments under the pretext of arranging a consultation with the right doctor,” Mahato said. The tout had even got the patient’s samples tested for biopsy at a private lab and had charged him an exorbitant amount, he added.
When asked, a senior professor at the hospital on condition of anonymity said, “A nexus between touts and hospital staff exists here. There are people who trick the patients into paying them for getting their medicines from the private clinics when they are already available at the hospital. The sole reason behind this menace is the lack of communication and support to the outside patients.”