LAHORE: Eight persons including several hockey Olympians have been arrested by local police on gambling charges.

The accused who were later on released on personal bail on Sunday include Olympians Kamran Ashraf, Mohammad Irfan, Danish Kaleem, Anjum Saeed, a PHF academy coach Zaheer Ahmad and others namely Qamar Irfan, Irfan Zia and Sohail Ashraf.

The accused will appear before the court again on Monday to confirm their bails.

According to police, the culprits were involved in gambling at a guesthouse from where an amount of Rs 35,000 has also been recovered which was at stake.

When contacted, Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF) president Akhtar Rasool told Dawn that he had formed a committee comprising Pervaiz Bhindara and Sahir Ahmad as members and headed by Col. Nadeem to complete an in-house inquiry.

He further said that he had also talked to high officials of police to find out the exact situation, adding that strict action would be taken, if anyone was found guilty.

Published in Dawn, August 18th, 2014