By Gurmukh Singh, IANS
Toronto : As global hunt continues for Amit Kumar, the kidney scamster has become the talk of town for Indo-Canadians across the country.
In radio chat shows and street chats, they blamed the Indian system for letting “a criminal like Dr. Amit Kumar to operate with impunity”.
Taking a dig at the nation’s medical system, many asked why he was allowed to practice after he was convicted in a previous kidney scam in 1993. What was the Indian Medical council doing, they asked.
“Thanks to its leaders and bureaucrats, India will never be free from corruption, and people will never learn to respect the rule of law,” said a businessman in Brampton, not far from where Kumar’s wife and two sons live.
Callers to Radio India talk show in Vancouver Wednesday said that Amit Kumar knew the safest place on this planet for a fugitive like him is India.
Calling the global hunt for him “a big ruckus”, many speculated that he might be hiding somewhere in India and would resurface when he thinks he can save his skin.
Lay people were of the view that the Indian (Gurgaon) police should be investigated first for letting this crook run his dubious kidney network.
“Why don’t they turn around and grill these Delhi – or whatever – cops who are now giving the impression of doing a great job? They should be the first to be hanged,” opined an Indo-Canadian working in a departmental store in Mississauga.
They also wondered how the Indian police gave him a clearance to apply for immigration to Canada.
Virtually every caller and street talker wanted the kidney kingpin to be thrown out of Canada and stripped of his ill-gotten wealth. Canada should have stringent laws to stop this kind of criminals from taking shelter here, they said.
When IANS asked some Indo-Canadians in Brampton and Mississauga, whether they knew anyone who had kidney transplant by Kumar, they shrugged it off.
“Do you think any Indo-Canadian will ever tell you that he underwent kidney transplant? Indians still attach stigma to these things. It is as a dirty secret. We will know the truth only when this man is caught and beaten blue and black by Indian cops to blurt out the truth,” said a trucker in Mississauga.
As speculation mounts over Kumar’s whereabouts, Interpol Canada says law enforcement agencies are in the hunt for him and cooperating with Indian authorities.
The police in Peel Region under which Brampton falls are directing all queries to Interpol Canada in Ottawa.