Team Herald
PANJIM: Almost a month after Herald broke the story of the “Clinically Researched Fraud”, Dr Amit Dias, who headed research projects in coordination with several NGOs stated that the report was inaccurate, defamatory and planted with malicious intent to defame him.
In an emailed clarification to the news report, Dias, who is Assistant Professor in the Department of Preventive Medicine, said that the heading “Goan patients used as guinea pigs for research” was used to sensationalise and does not in any way reflect the text.
On allegations that he misused his position as member of the Ethics Committee to get permission for his research, he says, “To deal with a potential conflict of interest, there are procedures laid down in the IEC.”
He has attached an RTI reply signed by the Institutional Ethics Committee member secretary Dr Amey Kamat, which states that Dias had ‘always recused himself from the decision making process whenever his research applications were considered by the IEC. He had in no way tried to influence the decisions of the IEC and all the applications were always considered on merit.’
Dias further says that he has never conducted a clinical drug trial and his research was mainly epidemiological and non-pharmacological and involved a variety of public health topics concerning Goa. The RTI letter too states that none of Dias’ applications during the period he was a member of the committee were for clinical drugs trials.
About his attendance at conferences, he clarified that he attended the conferences, without exhausting the duty leave to his credit.
“The allegations made are completely baseless. These are serious scientific meetings and not a ‘tour’ as the article mentions,” Dias says.
About his involvement with Sangath, he says, “Sangath is extremely transparent with its finance policy and all the accounts of the NGO are published on the website and are in open domain to maintain transparency.”
