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'No alcohol was found in Dipendra's blood sample'

In a startling revelation, a senior military doctor has claimed that no trace of alcohol was found in the blood samples of the late King Dipendra, accused of committing the June 1 palace massacre under the influence of liquor and drugs, a newspaper report said.

Brigadier (Dr) Khagendra Bahadur Shreshtha, who operated on Dipendra's brain at the Birendra Military Hospital soon after the shooting, told the high-level official panel probing the incident that no trace of alcohol was found in his blood during the surgery, a leading Nepalese weekly, Deshantar Saptahik, claimed.

Though blood samples collected from the site of the shooting showed traces of nicotine, they did not show traces of alcohol and psychotropic substances, the report said.

While making the inquiry report public on Thursday, the speaker of the Lower House, Taranath Ranabhat, had said that on that fateful Friday night, Dipendra had played billiards by himself or spent some time in the billiards room at the Tribhuvan Sadan inside the palace in the course of which he drank one or two pegs of The Famous Grouse whisky neat.

Quoting eyewitnesses, he also said that four close relatives of Dipendra saw the crown prince swaying, unable to hold himself upright, and wondering if it was the effect of the whisky, took him to his bedchamber inside Tribhuvan Sadan.

The two-member panel headed by Chief Justice Keshab Prasad Upadhyaya had alleged that Dipendra shot and killed his father King Birendra, mother Queen Aishwarya and seven other members of the royal family with automatic weapons at the palace, after a heavy intake of liquor and drugs.

PTI

Death of a Monarch: The Complete Coverage

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