Last week, when Sanjay Jaiswal, co-founder of Thakur Complex Residents Association, organised a vaccination camp in Kandivli East, he was flooded with phone calls from residents who wanted to know whether it was an authentic drive. “People are scared to sign up [for private vaccination camps]. From what we hear, three housing societies in the neighbourhood cancelled their vaccination drives and, some rerouted it to ours, because they thought it was legitimate. Many would prefer [to get jabbed] at a BMC centre over a private one at this point.” Jaiswal says he informed the residents to come to the camp only if they receive a CoWin reference message. “A lot of corporates have given a deadline to their employees to get themselves inoculated before a stipulated date if they wish to return to work. So people want to get vaccinated quickly.”

The panic is a fallout of the fraudulent Covid-19 vaccination drives conducted at nine locations in Mumbai, including the Hiranandani Heritage Society in Kandivli, whose residents were the first to question the validity of the vaccines. The society had reportedly paid R5 lakh to two agents—Rajesh Pandey and Sanjay Gupta of SP Events. Suspicions arose after none of the 390 residents developed post vaccination side effects or received their certificates. Subsequently, other scams came to light. Ramesh Taurani, founder of Tips Industries Limited, complained that 365 of his employees got vaccines on May 30 and June 3, but never received the certificates.