India, Nov. 19 -- Maharashtra's Directorate of Medical Education and Research (DMER) has constituted a committee to scrutinise a major procurement of 839 smoke detectors for three hospitals, after complaints surfaced, alleging grossly inflated pricing and questionable classification of high-end DETEX ductless autonomous smoke detector-cum-extraction units.

The action follows a government resolution (GR) issued on November 4, which contained plans to procure 839 DETEX units at Rs.9.54 lakh each - a price activists say is nearly 20 times the market rate. The total order, worth Rs.79.10 crore, had been cleared on the grounds that the equipment was a single-source product available only from one vendor. According to the GR, the units were to...