Visakhapatnam: Dr. Patchipala Namratha, managing director of Universal Srushti Fertility Centre, has once again been arrested for illegal practices allegedly carried out for monetary gain.Previously, in July 2020, Vizag police arrested Dr. Namratha and five others for trafficking newborns. Among the cases was the sale of a baby boy born to a rural woman in the undivided Vizag district, sold to a childless couple in Kolkata. Investigation had revealed that the gang sold six newborns.Dr. Namratha operated Universal Srushti Fertility and Research Centre in Vizag from 2018 and later expanded to Hyderabad, Vijayawada, Bhubaneswar, and Kolkata. Prior to 2018, she had faced criminal charges in different parts of Andhra Pradesh. Police said Dr Namrata used to conduct free medical camps with her teams (doctors, technicians and others) in Vizag, Vizianagaram and Srikakulam districts of north coastal Andhra Pradesh and neighbouring Odisha to identify poor and destitute pregnant women and women with unwanted pregnancies.The doctor also targeted egg donors and destitute pregnant women to procure babies for trafficking. She used to sell them to rich childless families through her agentsShe had developed a strong network of agents to identify destitute pregnant women and women with unwanted pregnancies to buy and trafficked their babies. She used to bring in women with unwanted pregnancies, promising to give them money and conduct the delivery for free in return for the baby, the police said. In a recent development linked to an alleged sale of a baby at the Srushti Test Tube Baby Centre in Secunderabad, Telangana police raided Universal Srushti Fertility Centre in Vizag and detained a woman for questioning. On July 27, officials from the medical and health department confirmed that the centre’s licence for conducting surrogacy had expired in 2023 and was no longer valid. However, the officials said they will visit the centre again to establish whether it is conducting any procedures without proper permission, they added.
