Indian police swooped down on a Delhi suburb Sunday morning and arrested five people, including a doctor, on suspicion of removing kidneys from young men without their consent with the intent of selling them to wealthy patients.

Local reports said that the illegal organ transplant trade was being operated in a private hospital in Gurgaon, just outside Delhi, where at least 500 kidneys have already been illegally transplanted.

Police said a doctor, whom they identified only as Upendra, operates the clinic.

"We found three victims at the hospital whose kidneys had been removed by doctors," said Gurgaon's police commissioner, Mahender Lal. "The racket had been going on for six to seven years. The victims used to be brought here with the lure of giving them jobs but their kidneys used to be removed. They were being given up to $2,500 for kidney removal."

Police said the victims were mostly poor workers from the villages near Delhi, lured to the clinic with promises of better the jobs offers.

However, once inside the clinic, the victims would be offered a sum of money in exchange for their kidneys.

Those who refused were drugged and operated on, police said.