Olympian Vijender Singh categorically denied on Monday that he had, at any stage, accepted heroin from NRI AS Kahlon, who was arrested last week with 26 kg heroin worth Rs130 crore in the international market.
Olympian Vijender Singh categorically denied on Monday that he had, at any stage, accepted heroin from NRI AS Kahlon, who was arrested last week with 26 kg heroin worth Rs130 crore in the international market.
Singh was grilled by a team of senior Punjab police officers at the Haryana police headquarters in Panchkula after he offered to record his statement.
MF Farooqui, the DIG, said details of his interrogation would be finalised on Tuesday. Singh has said he never took heroin in his life, he said.
In fact, Singh, the DIG said, saw a conspiracy against him by his rivals to jeopardise his boxing career. He offered to undergo a dope test, if needed.
The DIG said his questioning would carry on till late evening and if needed, might continue on Tuesday as well. Singh, according to sources, was also quizzed about his sparring partner Ram Singh’s statement that the two had taken small quantities of the drug as “food supplement”.
What about Brand Vijender: Unlike a boxing match where every reaction is instantaneous, brand consultants say in case of pugilist Vijender Singh, it will be a wait and watch game till he is proven guilty or otherwise.
But Singh, who shot to fame in the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics after winning a bronze medal — the first ever bronze by any Indian boxer, will see a major loss to his brand value even if proven not guilty.
“There are two things which always have a negative impact on the brand value of sportsmen, even if they are just allegations – involvement with women and drugs abuse,” Harish Bijoor, chief operation officer, Harish Bijoor Consults Inc., a brand consultancy firm, said. Bijoor said drugs are a taboo anywhere in the world and it is difficult to wash away the stains of even an allegation.
Singh currently endorses Venky’s Vencobb chicken, a brand from Pune-based Venkateshwara Hatcheries Group and the Sahara Group. The contract with Venky’s expires by the end of 2013 and with Sahara it goes on well into next year, as Sahara also promotes boxing as a sporting discipline and works with the national boxing federation.
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