When the FBI knocked on his door on a cold December morning in 2018, Dr Raj Bothra had no idea that his life was about to unravel. “I asked them, what was the reason [they came]?” he recalls. “They said, ‘We cannot tell you. The judge will tell you.’ One of the agents said, ‘You know, you’re lucky we caught you outside. We usually knock on the door and barge in while most people are still asleep.’”
What followed was a tale fit for a Netflix documentary.
The FBI’s case against Bothra and five of his colleagues—associated with The Pain Center USA and Interventional Pain Center—was placed in the wider opioid crisis. Clinics across the US were under the scanner for alleged overprescription of controlled substances. The government accused the group of defrauding Medicare (the national health insurance programme) and fuelling addiction by prescribing opioids “without legitimate medical purpose”.
The alleged fraud spanned from January 2013 to November 2018. As per the prosecutors, “Bothra prescribed some 12 million highly addictive Schedule II drugs.” He was accused of running “pill mills,” and fuelling “the social devastation of the opioid crisis claiming thousands of young lives”.
Bothra insists the charges were exaggerated and were “a desperate attempt to show action during a national crisis”. He says his practice, with 25,000 patients, was singled out because of its size and success.
Cut to 2025, and his life, spanning two continents and one unrelenting fight for justice, is finding its space on the silver screen. “I was just reading the final script a few days ago,” the 81-year-old tells THE WEEK on a morning call from Detroit. “It is very well done. I’m happy about that.”
In the movie directed by Ravi K. Chandran, Kabir Bedi will play the older Bothra, while Ankur Bhatia will portray his younger days in Mumbai.
Born and educated in India, Bothra always dreamt of becoming a surgeon. From Mumbai, he first went to England, where he practised for a while, and then landed in the US as a chief resident in his late 20s. The opportunities were vast and the rewards came fast. He rose rapidly through the US medical system and became an influential voice.
By the 1980s, he was an established surgeon with a thriving practice. He helped raise funds and sent equipment to Indian hospitals. His work led him to Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, who asked him to focus on drug abuse among India’s youth.
Bothra was straddling two worlds—politically active in the Republican Party and working with the Congress in India. “President George Bush (senior) came to my house, which was unheard of at that time,” he says. “I worked with Ronald Reagan, with Bush Sr and met [Richard] Nixon.”
He built relationships across governments and borders.
In 1999, President K.R. Narayanan awarded Bothra the Padma Shri—it was recognition of his decades of cross-border work in health care awareness and philanthropy. Life was going swimmingly.
But, at the turn of the century, Bothra saw medicine changing in ways that disturbed him. “Hospitals were being bought by private equity people; everything became commercialised,” he says. “So, I changed my speciality to interventional pain management; that is, chronic pain, but surgical.”
In parallel, the US began to see a growing opioid crisis with prescription painkillers, heroin and fentanyl flooding the streets. Over 15 years, Bothra’s practice treated over 25,000 patients, at times prescribing potent opioids. However, crucially, all these opioids were within regulations and, as Bothra argues, were crucial for pain management.
“I was the poster child for them,” he says. “Having the biggest practice, naturally the numbers were high—more patients, more prescriptions, more billing.”
When Bothra was first denied bail, the prosecution had argued: “Due to his numerous contacts in India and his significant financial assets here in America, he’s a flight risk. He was the ringleader of this whole operation. He has too many connections, and he was dishonest about his siblings and his assets. Surrendering his passport won’t guarantee he can’t flee the country.”
While his colleagues were eventually released on bail, he was denied the opportunity nine times. “They said $450 million was paid to my company,” he says. “It was $45 million over six years and government records can prove that. They said 12 million pills were prescribed. But for 25,000 patients, that’s one of the lowest per-patient rates in the country, less than CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) guidelines. The idea was to keep me inside, break me, and make me plead guilty so others would fall.”
Bothra spent 1,301 days in prison without bail. “[It was] dehumanising,” he says.
He writes in his book USA vs Raj: “The brutal Michigan winter was unsparing. In a desperate attempt to fend off the bitter cold, I requested an extra blanket. This request was shot down. I was told I needed to see a doctor to verify my hypothyroidism, which makes you feel cold, to justify my need for an additional blanket. This required me to wait an additional two weeks for the results of my thyroid blood test.”
When the system refused him warmth, humanity found a way. “Eventually, in a show of camaraderie, a fellow inmate offered me his extra blanket that he had been hiding from the guards.”
During his second bail hearing came the moment, he says, that “sucker punched” his faith in fairness. “They said, ‘One of the charges being brought against you is the over-prescription of opioids. This deems you a potential menace to society. Bail is denied’,” he says. “This is against the US constitution. They were sure they could break me. Only 0.03 per cent of people win against the government. The justice system here is corrupt from top to bottom, except the jury.”
Bothra refused to surrender. “I told them clearly that I might compromise on certain things, even fines, but I will never plead guilty,” he says. “It’s a question of my honour, my family’s honour, my country’s honour.”
His lawyers warned him that ‘no one wins’. “They said I would die in prison. I said so be it. I’ll die in prison, but I’m never going to plead guilty,” he says, pausing in between. “What would my daughter say in school? That her father is a convicted felon? I couldn’t accept that.”
Even his wife begged him to sign a plea deal. She had had a cardiac arrest while he was in jail. “They told her I would come home in a black bag,” he says softly. “She was scared to death.”
It was during those long months that the idea of his book was born. “It’s a true story,” he says. “Anybody can challenge it if they want to.”
When his trial finally began, it lasted seven weeks. “I prepared most of my defence myself,” he says. “I did not have a good relationship with my attorneys because they wanted me to plead guilty.” One of them, he says, charged him a flat fee of $500,000, claiming he could get bail. “I let him try, but didn’t get my hopes up,” he says.
Then came an absurd suggestion. “I couldn’t believe it when the attorney said I should fake a fall. ‘Since you had vertigo in the past,’ he said, ‘this could get you admitted to the hospital to bolster our chances.’ It was theatrical,” he says.
Finally, the day of the verdict arrived. “The court was filled with the press and TV—jam-packed,” he says. “Usually, the jury foreman reads the judgment. But the judge said he was going to do it himself. ‘Count one,’ he said, and then he did not speak for 30 seconds. It looked like an eternity. I looked at my wife and daughter who were sitting at the back—everybody was praying. It was such a tense moment. It is difficult to describe it.”
He stops for a moment before continuing. “After the pause, the judge said, ‘Not guilty.’ He had to say that 54 times. My daughter (Sonia) was standing up [towards the end]. As soon as the judge announced ‘Not guilty, Dr Raj Bothra is free to go,’ my daughter began sobbing so loudly that the whole court started looking at her. She came and fell in my arms. The whole world stopped for me.”
Sonia, whom he had adopted from Mother Teresa’s orphanage, was his strongest pillar of support during his darkest days. During one of her visits, she told Bothra about falling in love with a Muslim man. “I told her that I had no objection,” he says. “She married him soon after because there was no guarantee when I would be released. Everyone told her I would never come home.”
But he did. And recently, he celebrated the birthday of his twin granddaughters. That celebration, in fact, is now the film’s ending.