Psychiatrists to go on strike; Police suspect big drug racket and massive illegal operations

Fron the Times of India

After procuring huge amounts of psychotropic pills from Dr Sudha Vasudev's private clinic at Mullanpur Dhaka and her residence at Rishi Nagar in Ludhiana on Saturday, the Jagraon police have said there is a big racket, and there could be other arrests soon.

Meanwhile, functioning of psychiatry OPDs in hospitals, clinics and nursing homes in Punjab and Chandigarh would be hit on Monday as psychiatrists under Indian Psychiatry Society and Indian Association of Private Psychiatry, Punjab and Chandigarh, have come out in the support of two doctors, arrested by Jagraon police for the illegal sale of psychotropic drugs at their private clinics in Mullanpur Dhaka and Khanna, and have decided to go on a strike on Monday.

"There are not just two doctors. We are getting many other links and it is too complicated. For the time being, we can say that there is a big racket involved, and we are trying to unearth some other important facts. We will disclose it at the right time," said SSP Jagraon, Ravcharan Singh Brar, who raided and arrested Dr Sudha Vasudev, in-charge of a drug de-addiction centre at Mullanpur Dhaka, from a hospital that did not have a licence to run the psychiatry clinic.

It is to be noted that on Saturday, police investigated the residence of Dr Sudha, from where they procured 18,000 more pills and another cache schedule H drugs. "The huge amount of psychotropic drugs and bills show that the company and the doctor had pacts and were doing it for a long time," he added.

According to rules, such drugs are not allowed at the residence of doctors and in private clinics. This is completely illegal, and the search is still on. According to sources, the medicine was Beuprinorphine, which has strong elements to wean addicts from drugs like heroin and smack, but at the same time, it also creates an alternate addiction. Some psychiatrists are still using it. Police said they have also recovered the receipt of Rs70,000 for buying the same drugs from a pharma company in bulk. Previously, on Friday, 3,600 pills were collected from her private clinic.

Presently, Dr Sudha is on two days remand by the orders of the local court, and this may increase as the investigation continues, and layers keep unfolding. She had be charged under three acts - Drugs and Cosmetics Act, NDPS Act for selling illegal psychotropic drugs at a private clinic, and Prevention of Corruption Act for trying to bribe the police to hush up the matter on the spot.

Notorius US Psychiatrist and Pedophile Arrested in India

As Reported by the BBC

Police in India's southern Tamil Nadu state say they are awaiting a request from the US authorities to extradite a convicted American paedophile.

Alan J Horowitz was detained in the seaside resort of Mahabalipuram near Madras (Chennai) on Wednesday.

He is wanted by Interpol and listed among the 100 most wanted men in New York. He was convicted in 1991 for sexually abusing numerous children.

He spent 15 years in a US jail and violated his parole in 2004.

'Sexual predator'

Indian police say they closed in on Horowitz in Mahabalipuram, a popular tourist spot 50km (30 miles) from Madras, after an 11-month chase across Asia.

Tamil Nadu state police chief D Mukherjee said an alert had been issued by Interpol for Horowitz's arrest.

A child psychiatrist and an ordained Jewish rabbi, 60-year-old Horowitz was a notorious sex offender.

His listing on the New York State Division of Parole website says he sexually abused "numerous underage males and females known to him through his position of authority".

The Division of Parole's head, George Alexander, said in a statement: "We are extremely pleased to have this dangerous sexual predator in custody and look forward to bringing him back to New York."

Horowitz violated his parole last year and fled the US using fake travel documents.

He is thought to have spent time in Thailand and Hong Kong before arriving in the southern Indian city of Bangalore a fortnight ago.

Interpol are believed to have tracked him to Mahabalipuram, where he checked into a hotel.

Following information from Interpol, US diplomats then alerted the Tamil Nadu police who moved in.

The BBC's TN Gopalan in Madras says that with Horowitz now in custody, extradition proceedings are expected to begin soon.

See also this report:

Alan Horowitz, the notorious child molester who boldly dispatched a good-bye letter of sorts to his parole officer last year after bolting abroad, has been arrested in India, authorities said.

The arrest -- made Tuesday in India at 3:48 p.m., which was early Tuesday here -- ends a remarkable 11-month global manhunt for a man authorities describe as a remorseless predator with a brilliant mind.

A tip e-mailed to the "America's Most Wanted" television program steered authorities toward Horowitz -- one of New York's 100 most-wanted fugitives -- in Mahabalipuram, a city of about 12,000 on India's southeastern coast, parole officials said.

The U.S. Marshals Service, which joined the hunt for the Harvard-educated Level 3 sex offender in November, confirmed that Horowitz, 60, a trained rabbi, had been taken into custody.

Citing the sensitivity of the process of having Horowitz returned to the United States, the federal agency declined further comment.

Horowitz is being held on a U.S. warrant and is not accused of additional crimes in India, said Mark Johnson, a spokesman for the state Division of Parole.

Johnson said local authorities are examining Horowitz' travel documents, which included U.S. and Israeli passports. It could be days or weeks, he said, before Horowitz is returned to the United States, where he would face at least a parole violation, if not more charges.

The former psychiatrist who specialized in adolescents has dual citizenship in the United States and Israel. But he had no permission to leave the country, parole officials have said.

Retired Schenectady Police Investigator Peter McGrath, who tracked Horowitz across the country while trying to build a case against him more than a decade ago, said Tuesday he never doubted authorities would eventually find the man, who he counts among the most cunning predators he ever encountered.

"I knew they would (get him). I know the guys working on the case, and I knew they would," a pleased McGrath said after he was told of Horowitz' apprehension. "That's great."

In 1991, Horowitz was charged in Schenectady with more than 35 counts of sexual abuse and sodomy against three boys and a girl, all younger than 17. He later pleaded guilty and served more than 13 years in prison before he was paroled in 2004 as a highest-level sex offender.

Horowitz' documented criminal past dates to at least 1982 in Maryland, where he received five years' probation for "perverted sex practices," according to parole officials. But McGrath has said he believes there were more victims elsewhere who never came forward.

Once he was paroled in New York, Horowitz abided by the strict conditions of his release for about two years before apparently hopping a plane from New Jersey to Tokyo last June 8, just 24 hours after meeting with his parole officer, authorities have said.

Later that month, Horowitz' parole officer received a letter from him postmarked in Israel saying he'd never return to the United States -- a clear-cut violation of his parole, which lasts until 2011.

About the same time Horowitz jumped parole, he informed another branch of state law enforcement -- the Division of Criminal Justice Services, which runs the sex offender registry -- that he was supposedly living in a Tel Aviv apartment complex. Whether he ever did, and where else he may have visited while on the run, was not clear Tuesday.

Jon Leiberman, a correspondent for "America's Most Wanted," which aired a segment on Horowitz in February, said the tip that turned the case came early this month.

"Obviously he thought he could go to India and blend in," Leiberman said.

Another Suicide in connection with long term psychiatric treatment

As reported in the Hindustani Times

Nipun Doshi, the boyfriend of 25-year-old MBA graduate Charisma Kadakia who jumped to death at Malabar Hill on Saturday afternoon, will probably steer clear of legal trouble as psychiatrist Dr DT Lakdawala confirmed to the police on Monday that the girl was under his treatment for the last four years.

Charisma had jumped from the fourth floor of Navyug Sagar building at Malabar Hill where Doshi lived.

According to DCP Pratap Dighavkar (Zone II), Dr Lakdawala, in a statement to the Malabar Hill police, on Monday evening, told the police that Charisma was suffering from a psychological disorder for the past six years. "We have questioned Dr Lakdawala to understand the circumstances under which Charisma took such a drastic step. The doctor told us that Charisma used to have mood swings on a regular basis," said Dighavkar.

"We have registered a case of accidental death under Sections 174 of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC)," he added. Even though, Charisma jumped off the Navyug Sagar building, in the presence of Senior Inspector of Malabar Hill police station, Ishak Bagwan, the death is considered to be unnatural.

"We are also questioning Nipun and Charisma's neighbours to find out about the kind of relationship they shared. The investigations are on, although Charisma's parents do not want to blame anybody for their daughter's death," Dighavkar added.

He confirmed that the couple were seeing each other for the past three months and were planning to get married.

Neither of their parents had opposed the marriage. However, they had put the marriage on hold until Charisma's treatment was complete.

"This might possibly be the reason behind Charisma's depression that could have led her to take such an extreme step," Dighavkar said.

No direct connection that the psychiatric treatment was the actual cause of the suicide, just another one of those pesky coincidences.