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Charge sheet filed in Queen Latifa doping case

Last Updated 11 April 2018, 09:03 IST

The Criminal Investigation Department has filed a charge sheet in race horse Queen Latifa doping case.

The charge sheet was filed before the first ACMM court by a team led by CID DySP K Nanjundai Gowda against Bangalore Turf Club (BTC) Ltd chief executive officer S Nirmal Prasad and six other employees Pradyumna Singh, Dr H S Mahesh, Vivek Ubhayekar, Arjun Sajnani and Neil Darashah. The chargesheet contains statements of 44 witnesses, including jockey Suraj Narredu, who rode Queen Latifa.

Three-year-old Queen Latifa had won the "race course owners association" prize on March 5, 2017. The horse's urine sample was sent to the National Doping Test Laboratory (NDTL) in Delhi. Experts reported that the horse was given a steroid on March 23.

BTC officials were immediately required to go the location where Queen Latifa had been trained (stable) to review. They had to find whether any injection or forbidden drug was found at the turf. But officials did not visit the stable and also hid the experts' report. This caused loss to the people who took part in the betting, the charge sheet stated.

Owner of Queen Latifa Arjun Sajnani was close to club's board of directors and senior steward Vivek Ubhayekar. Both of them lived in the same apartment complex Skyline Residency on Lavelle Road. Ubhayekar backed Sajnani even after it was found that the horse was doped.

"Nirmal Prasad, former BTC secretary volunteered to retire in 2016. However, Ubhayekar helped Nirmal continue as the CEO. In return, Nirmal helped Ubhayekar and Sajnani in doping the horse," a senior police official said.

"Ubhayekar and Pradyumna Singh ensured that the NDTL report went unnoticed by then president N Harindra Shetty. Fearing that Shetty would come to know about the misdeeds, Ubhayekar hatched a conspiracy to force Shetty to step down as president," the official added.

Fake report

The European Horse Race Scientific Liaison Committee recommends that every 10 ml of urine collected from a horse may have 10 nanograms of Procaine content. Anything in excess is not allowed.

However, the accused created false documents claiming that the Quanti Laboratory of Mauritius had stated that there was no such drug in Queen Latifa's body, the officials said.

Meanwhile, the CID charge sheet stated that another horse 'Rafa' was also doped. The board of directors then went to the spot and made an inspection. Rafa's trainer Dominic questioned why his stable was being checked and not Queen Latifa's. Queen Latifa's stable was checked 15 days later because of this objection. However, by then, coach Neil Darashah had cleaned up the spot.

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(Published 10 April 2018, 18:58 IST)

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