NEW DELHI, 5 June 2006 — A day after clearing Rahul Mahajan of taking cocaine at a party at his house on Thursday night, Delhi’s Apollo Hospital yesterday said urine samples of the son of Pramod Mahajan have proved positive for cocaine, alcohol and some other sedatives.
On Saturday, Dr. Anupam Sibal of Apollo Hospital, where Rahul was admitted after losing consciousness early Friday, said that Rahul had tested negative for drugs.
Tests conducted at Dr. Lal’s Pathological Lab, a reputed private testing laboratory in the capital, has detected traces of cocaine along with sedatives benzodiazipine and cannabinoids. The test report revealed Rahul’s urine sample had 3.9 units of cocaine, 8.83 units of cannabinoids and 211.19 units of benzodiazipine. The blood sample showed 18.4 units of alcohol in his body.
“Benzodiazipine is a non-narcotic sedative. It can be mixed with cocaine for consumption,” Dr. S.P. Boytra, medicine specialist at Sir Ganga Ram Hospital, said. “When people get accustomed to certain narcotic substances, they generally go for mixing them with such sedatives to get additional stimulation,” Boytra added.
According to experts, cannabinoids is a narcotic substance of the opiate group. “Narcotics like marijuana and hashish come under the opiate category,” said a senior doctor at one of the major hospitals in Delhi dealing with drug abuse cases.
Apollo’s Dr. Sibal stood by his Saturday’s statement. “We are not giving anybody a clean bill of health. We conducted a test in our lab and there was no trace of cocaine or ecstasy found in the urine sample. However, negligible traces of cocaine have been found from the sample that was given to Dr. Lal Path Lab,” said Sibal. “We are not going to conduct any further toxic screen to determine the availability of any known drug,” he added.
The police are tracking a trail of drugs, international involvement and alleged attempts at cover-up as the mystery continued to deepen over the suspected substance abuse by Rahul and Mahajan’s aide Vivek Moitra. Moitra died before reaching hospital early Friday.
Police have detained six Nigerian nationals in connection with the case. The Nigerians were picked up from different parts of the city after police teams conducted a series of raids Saturday night.
“They are suspected to be part of the drug cartel that supplied drugs to Rahul Mahajan and Vivek Moitra,” a police officer said.
The interrogation of Sahil Zarru, a key witness to the widely suspected indulgence in drink and drugs by the high-profile duo, began at the special cell immediately after he was brought from Srinagar to New Delhi on Sunday afternoon. His interrogation is expected to yield vital clues to a puzzle whose ramifications have become the subject of national attention for its possible political overtones.
“Sahil is likely to provide crucial clues that can help us to put together the sequence of events on the fateful night,” said an official investigating the case. He said police had questioned 21 people, including Harish Sharma, Pramod Mahajan’s personal assistant.
Police said a team was sent to Apollo Hospital to try to speak to Rahul but the questioning could not take place due to his condition and the team had to return.
A special team of Delhi police went to Jammu and Kashmir’s summer capital Srinagar after Sahil, one of the four people said to be present at the party at Mahajan’s residence, surfaced there Saturday. The three others had surrendered Friday.
Delhi police are also carrying out raids across the capital to nab the man who had supplied narcotics to Sahil as reported by him. “We are carrying raids and some drug peddlers have been questioned,” said an official.
“We have the phone number of the drug peddler and we are trying to trace him through that. Sahil was in contact with the peddler so he should be able to give us more details about him. We should get some answers from his questioning,” the official said.
Despite Apollo Hospital on Saturday saying it could not find traces of drug in Rahul’s blood, Delhi police registered a case of drug abuse and destruction of evidence against “unknown persons” on Saturday evening.
— Additional input from agencies
