Dust is flying at the Royal Western India Turf Club (RWITC) and this time it is not from the horse's hooves. The club has a seven-person committee currently and all are re-contesting the elections to the Turf Club to be held at Mahalaxmi racecourse on September 6 (the e-voting has already begun). There are five new contenders giving an interesting twist to the turf tussle.

Ghost labour
To a question about jumping into the controversial cauldron that the workings of the high-profile club can be at times, candidate Surendra Sanas, 64, retorted, "I am not here to fight, I am here to work. I have been a member of the Pune Turf Clubhouse committee in Pune looking after the infrastructure at the Pune racecourse. I have turned around the finances of the club. I investigated and called out ghost labour in the club." Asked to elaborate on the term ghost labour, Sanas said, "People who were working for three days were being paid for 30 days! That is what I mean by ghost labour. I have also concentrated on reducing sand wastage in Pune. A huge amount of sand was being ordered for the track, but a lot of it was being wasted, I looked into that too."