The vaccine scamster of Kolkata

Masquerading as an IAS officer, Debanjan Deb held several fake COVID-19 vaccination camps in the city, duping hundreds of people for money. Shiv Sahay Singh reports on Deb’s carefully cultivated image and how his web of lies was finally unravelled

A hoarding in blue and white bearing the logo of the Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) hangs outside an office located on the third floor of a building in Kasba. Unlike the dingy, cramped offices that define the KMC, this space, in a building referred to as the UCO Bank building, on Rajdanga Main Road, has a cheerful look. It is festooned with balloons in the official colours of the West Bengal government, blue and white. The hoarding lists in exhaustive detail the activities carried out by the civic body: ‘Urban Planning and Development’, ‘I&PR’ (Information and Public Relations), ‘Urban Management’, ‘Environment and Heritage Department’. And so on. These are all not what they appear to be — signs of a celebration; they are, in fact, the only remains of an audacious vaccination racket that has been carried out from these premises. In charge of the scam was a stocky man aged 28, for about a year. The fact that Deb while posing as a government servant has left the Mamata Banerjee government red-faced, investigating officers astounded and the people scared.