New allegations of discrimination and bias against South Asian veterinary doctors are being levelled against the College of Veterinarians of B.C. after the college opened yet another investigation into the practice of an Indo-Canadian veterinary clinic owner.

One of the college’s investigators was secretly recorded making disparaging remarks about Hakam Bhullar just one day after the college met with the East Vancouver veterinarian to discuss findings of the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal.

Bhullar and other South Asian veterinarians led a 12-year fight against the college and its predecessor, the B.C. Veterinary Medical Association, alleging they were being systematically discriminated against on the basis of ethnicity. Earlier in October, the tribunal soundly found in favour of them, awarding 13 veterinarians monetary damages and ordering the college to stop its discriminatory practices.

Video: Bhullar reacts to Human Rights decision again College of Veterinarians

But last week a secret recording made during a new investigation captured disparaging remarks levelled at Bhullar.

In the recordings provided to The Vancouver Sun, a college investigator is heard telling someone the college is out to “nail” Bhullar and will never give him back his licence because he “is unmanageable.” The investigator, Hudson Andrews, a contract member of the provincial government’s health professional bodies and governmental agencies division, is also heard saying that the college planned to “get” Bhullar by reporting him to the Canada Revenue Agency, the Labour Standards Branch and Employment and Immigration.

But Larry Odegard, the college’s registrar and CEO, denied the allegations. He said the college had begun an investigation of Bhullar four months ago after it received complaints he might be practicing veterinary medicine without a licence. The association took away Bhullar’s licence in 2009 as a result of an investigation that led, in part, to his complaint of discrimination to the Human Rights Tribunal.

Odegard said Andrews was hired to investigate the latest allegation and had not yet completed his work when the tribunal’s decision was rendered.

Bhullar told The Sun he’d learned that the college had started a new investigation of him just before the human rights tribunal was to render its decision, and he believed they were looking for any way to prevent him from regaining his license. He said he asked a longtime friend, Heather Pendragon, to pretend she was a disgruntled ex-employee named “Hedy Mastel” to determine what the college was doing.

Bhullar and other South Asian veterinarians have used Pendragon before in 2005 and 2009 to secretly record members of the provincial association making disparaging comments about them.

Bhullar said he was particularly worried about Andrews’ statements to Pendragon that other veterinarians would “like to shoot this guy” and “string this guy up.”

“Those are threats. I have to take those threats seriously,” Bhullar said, adding he planned to file a complaint with Vancouver Police.

Bhullar’s lawyer Clea Parfitt said the college never informed her client he was under investigation, in contravention of previous practices, and that it had all the hallmarks of a campaign to discredit Bhullar despite the tribunal’s admonishments that the college should stop such “fishing expeditions.”