The doctor is in judicial custody.
Another layer of murkiness has been added to the Pune Porsche accident case, in which an allegedly inebriated 17-year-old boy rammed into and killed two techies on a bike, with police sources revealing that the doctor who helped switch the accused's blood samples had provided the same 'service' to several other people through a network of brokers.
Dr Ajay Tawade, the head of Sassoon Hospital's Forensic Medical Department, who has been arrested in the case and is in judicial custody, is one of the doctors who had allegedly switched the minor's blood samples with those of his mother to ensure that no alcohol was found in the final report.
Sources in the Pune Crime Branch told NDTV that their investigation has revealed that this was not the first time Dr Tawade had done something like that. Whenever there were high-profile cases of drunk drivers running over and killing people, the doctor's brokers, spread across Pune and four other districts in Western Maharashtra, would get in touch with the families and offer to switch their blood samples with clean ones so that the accused could get away with a milder charge.
"The brokers would demand lakhs for the service, usually above Rs 5 lakh, and the money would be funnelled to Dr Tawade, with them keeping a cut," said a source, adding that this had been going on since the doctor took over the forensic department nearly two years ago.
Mr Tawade has faced serious allegations earlier as well. He had been accused in drug cases and a kidney transplant racket, and had allegedly been elevated to the post of the forensic department head at the recommendation of an MLA and a minister.
Last month, Vinayak Kale, the dean of Sassoon Hospital, had said Maharashtra Medical Education Minister Hasan Mushrif and MLA Sunil Tingre - both from the Ajit Pawar faction of the NCP - had written a letter and asked for Dr Tawade to be made the head of the department. Mr Kale was sent on compulsory leave soon after making the statement.
MLA Tingre was also accused of visiting the Yerwada police station after the Porsche crash and pressuring officials to go easy on the case.
The accident had taken place around 2.15 am on May 19, when the 17-year-old, who had been drinking with his friends in two pubs in Pune to celebrate his Class 12 results, knocked down the two 24-year-old IT professionals in the Kalyani Nagar area. He was driving a Rs 2.5-crore Porsche at over 150 kmph.
Aneesh Awadhiya, who was riding the bike, was sent flying and hit a parked car, while Ashwini Koshta - who was riding pillion - was flung 20 feet into the air. Both of them died on the spot.
At 17 years and 8 months old, the teenager was four months short of the legal age for driving and more than seven years shy of Maharashtra's legal age for drinking.