The Bangalore trainers are in the habit of surrendering their licenses at the slightest pretext to negate any steps taken by BTC and they have got away with their acts of omission in the past. The trainers association surrendered the licenses of 24 of its members (most of whom were reluctant to take the measure) last week stating that in view of the new regulations proposed by the Bangalore Turf Club, racing activity will not run in a fair, profitable and equitable manner without elaborating what these words meant.

Some of the trainers were hard pressed to explain their position. Perhaps they also didn’t understand the fact that license to train horses was given by the turf club and not KTA.. Some of these trainers were regretting their act and were planning to approach the Secretary of the Club to request him to return their licenses. To their delight, the club’s move to hand back the licenses to trainers on Monday morning, reminding them of the responsibilities associated with their job made many of them happy. This also took the KTA by surprise.

Karnataka Trainers Association was protesting principally against the decision of BTC to reduce the BTF loan facility to just month. The BTF is paid by the owners of race horses and as such the turf club’s move did not have direct bearing on the trainers unless quite a few of them feared that owners would default. That was a poor statement against the race horse owners who have entrusted horses to them in good faith. The trainers had the gumption to express lack of confidence in them and wanted BTC tot take the responsibility of getting the BTF. In other words, they were expressing loudly that most race horse owners are defaulters and BTC should bail them out! The relationship between trainers and owners is direct and BTC does not play any role in the arrangement. It is the trainers who introduce owners for registration and hence the onus is on them to get the BTF paid by the owners. It is surprising that KROA is seen to be supporting the stand of KTA which has expressed lack of confidence in the ability of the race horse owners to pay the training fees on time by not defaulting.

The BTC wrote a letter to KTA stating that the association had no locus standi as the license to train was an issue between the club and the individual trainers concerned. Further, these trainers were expected to comply with the Rules of Racing of the Club which required them to take care of the horses in their custody and therefore in the event of their desire to surrender their license, they had to make alternate arrangements with the concurrence of owners so that the horses and race horse owners don’t suffer from any adverse consequences of their action. This indeed was a googly that the Karnataka Trainers Association did not anticipate. With many of the trainers not wanting to support KTA in its action, their position was bound to be diluted in a significant manner. For the record leading trainers like S Ganapathy, Jaggy Dhariwal, S Padmanabhan, Darius Byramji and a few others had refused to follow KTA’s dictate.

The President of KTA B Puttanna believes that all problems can be sorted out across the table with a bit of give and take. But the action of KTA does not justify this belief.