Are the city’s prominent drug store dealers playing with the lives of the people by selling sub-standard and duplicate surgical material used in complex brain and heart surgeries?

This could well be true given that two of the city’s prominent wholesale chemists were found selling such equipment by the Crime Branch of the Chandigarh Police on Tuesday.

Kumar Brothers in Sector 11 and Jindal Associates in Sector 24 were found to have stored duplicate surgical equipment under the brand name of Johnson and Johnson by the police.

Acting on the complaint of the Brand Integrity Manager of Johnson and Johnson, the Crime Branch raided the two shops and recovered from their stores duplicate surgical material including prolene mesh and sutures, valued at Rs 1.5 lakh.

While prolene mesh is used the treatment of hernia, sutures are used to hold tissues in case of surgeries, including heart procedures. Their quality is of utmost importance as sub-standard material can cause infections.

Madhur Verma, SP (City and Crime), confirmed that the police acted on the complaint and recovered the duplicate material from the two stores.

While Ashwani Kumar Singla, owner of Kumar Brothers, fled from the spot at the time of the raid, Navdeep Kumar of Jindal Associates was arrested on the charges of duplication under the Copyright Act, the police said.