Pune: The court of judicial magistrate first class A A Pandey has granted bail to Dr Ajay Taware, the suspended head of Sassoon General Hospital’s forensic science department, in the 2022 kidney transplant case at Ruby Hall Clinic. He was the head of the regional authorisation committee (RAC for organ transplant, the Sassoon Authority Committee, and was the medical superintendent at the time when the transplant process took place and was completed at Ruby Hall Clinic. However, Taware will remain under judicial custody at Yerawada Central Jail as he is a co-accused in the blood sample swap case linked to the May 19, 2024, Porsche Taycan car crash case.The magistrate, in its order of Aug 26, said, “Seriousness of an offence cannot be a ground to reject bail. Taware’s role is restricted to being head of the RAC, which was supposed to schedule interviews and verify the genuineness of the donors and their relatives. He is facing allegations of negligence in not verifying the documents of the donors and their relatives. Police completed the investigation and filed a chargesheet against him. He is also entitled to claim bail on parity because the other co-accused have been released on bail.”The court granted bail to Taware on furnishing a personal bond of Rs1 lakh with one or more sureties in the like amount. Pressing for bail, Taware’s lawyers, Jitendra Sawant and Abhishek Bade, argued that their client was head of the RAC comprising five members and that he alone could not be held liable in the kidney transplant case. There were no allegations of a money trail against their client, the lawyers said, adding the 16 co-accused had been released on bail.The state prosecution opposed Taware’s bail plea saying that there was prima facie evidence against him to show his involvement in the crime. The RAC was responsible for carefully scrutinising organ transplant papers related to the proposed donor and the receiver, sent by the hospital where the transplant was to be performed, and clearing them on establishing all credentials, the prosecution said.The prosecution’s case is that Taware was arrested on May 28, 2025, based on a five-member state health department inquiry committee’s report of May 2022 that indicted him and four others in the RAC for misusing their position to aid kidney swap transplants based on bogus persons and forged documents.
