Update: Golden Arrows, upon finding the judgement passed by the dzongkhag court on December 20 last year unsatisfactory, has appealed to the High Court.

Golden Arrows’ player Karma Dorji said that the verdict passed by bench III of the Thimphu Dzongkhag Court was not in favour of the Yangphel Archery Committee.

According to the verdict, Golden Arrows didn’t receive the claim of Nu 10,000 as the registration fee and also Nu 86,500, expenses incurred during the tournament.

However, Karma Dorji said that the court had also asked Yangphel to impart all the relevant rules and regulations before conducting future tournaments to all the participating teams and players. “This clearly shows that the case was not in favour of Yangphel,” he said.

According to Karma Dorji, the court in the verdict had not considered the witnesses produced by the team. “We produced two witnesses from the public, but the court had just considered the statement given by Yangphel’s lone witness, who is a member from our opponent.”

Following a physical brawl on August 18, 2015 during the knockout stages of the 19th Yangphel Open Archery Tournament, the Yangphel Archery Committee disqualified team Golden Arrows and Bhutan Festival for having been involved in the brawl.

Karma Dorji claimed that since Yangphel failed to produce a written document stating the reason for their disqualification immediately after the event, the team decided to file a petition against the organisers on September 7, 2015.

He also said that a backdated letter was left at the archery canteen a few days after the incident.

The committee’s president, Tsewang Rinchen, said that the committee holds the right whether or not to provide a written document against teams.

According to the Yangphel regulations decisions of penalties on disciplinary issues may be issued in written format to the player at fault and depending on severity of the case, announced through media, posters or other forms of public announcements (including its website and through social media).

Tsewang Rinchen said that the written document comes as an additional penalty to the team as a means to further humiliate the team involved. “We were satisfied with the judgement passed by the dzongkhag court,” he said, adding the appeal made by the team comes as an additional harassment to the committee. “We will respond accordingly henceforth.”

Meanwhile, the rules and regulation of the Yangphel Archery Committee is available on the committee’s website and it is also displayed during all the Yangphel tournaments.

Younten Tshedup