Making a mockery of Govt directive!

One of the conditions laid down by the International Association of Athletics Federations in its revised anti-doping rules that came into force on January 1, 2019 is the incorporation of those rules into the rules of the national federations.

This provision is nothing new. It has been there for quite some time. But with the new categorization of countries and new set of obligations for each group of countries in the fight against doping, this provision assumes more significance than ever before.

The IAAF has categorized member nations as per its own assessment about doping in athletics across the world, with category ‘A’ that includes Kenya and Ethiopia being considered as that having the “highest risk” for doping in the sport. India is in category ‘B’ along with 56 other countries. Those 56 include practically all leading nations in athletics in the world including the US, Britain, Jamaica, France, Germany and South Africa. Any country may be in danger of being sanctioned if it has three or more international-level athletes who have committed anti-doping rule violations during a 12-month period.

Has the Athletics Federation of India (AFI) amended its constitution to fall in line with the IAAF regulations? Since some of these regulations were part of the IAAF anti-doping rules in the past, did the AFI get them into their constitution or make a reference to it in its constitution?

Reference to IAAF rules is there in the AFI constitution, but not about following the latest IAAF anti-doping rules or that of the National Anti-Doping Agency (NADA).

Outdated rules

In fact, the AFI constitution, amended up to 14 April, 2013 contains a mixture of IAAF anti-doping rules and its own rules that may date back to the 1990s! As per these rules, the AFI units and the AFI are competent to deal with anti-doping measures in the country and the AFI tribunal would be the competent hearing authority. The truth is, individual federations have had practically no role to play in anti-doping exercise in India since the advent of NADA in 2009.

These are outdated that need to go out of the AFI constitution. But that alone is not the issue now. Should AFI be incorporating the IAAF anti-doping rules either directly or by reference into its constitution? If that is accomplished, then where will the NADA rules come in?

The AFI can always argue that it had long ago put up a note on NADA on its website, as mandated by the Ministry of Sports, but that note does not say much about anything. It says AFI "liaises" with IAAF and NADA on all issues connected with anti-doping. It also says AFI is in “compliance with IAAF rules for anti-doping and WADA Code”. Both are wrong assumptions.

The IAAF in its revised rules has provided a provision to such National federations that may have to delegate the anti-doping task to another organization because of a legislation or government order that it could achieve its obligations through such organization. But the federation would be held “in breach” if the relevant organization fails to meet the requirements of the National federation under the IAAF rules. In short, if NADA errs, AFI would be held responsible!

No change in more than three years

Back in November, 2015, one had written a piece on AFI and other National Federations being in breach of NADA anti-doping rules and the WADA Code in not incorporating the rules into their constitution by reference or directly in their constitutions. There has not been any appreciable change in the attitude of the federations through the past three years.

The AFI has stuck to its constitution though it is one of the few federations that have placed on record on its website some anti-doping rules, even if outdated and inadequate, and some provision to acknowledge the existence of NADA. By no stretch of imagination can this be construed a delegation of authority to NADA to manage anti-doping activities or an admission that NADA rules would apply. Now that the IAAF has also insisted that its rules need to be incorporated by the National federations, the AFI has its task cut out.

The Indian Olympic Association (IOA) has a page on its website that mentions anti-doping. It is a token statement about doping and its ramifications and could have been presented in a more detailed, meaningful manner. But at least the IOA has something over there rather than having nothing at all.

What about other leading federations?

Hockey India the lone exception

As one found in 2015,  Hockey India is the only federation among Olympic sports in India to have clearly delegated the authority to NADA to carry out anti-doping measures and results management,

One wished HI could have displayed these anti-doping rules under a separate ‘anti-doping’ head rather than buried it under HI rules on its website. It also has another set of rules under ‘technical’ that includes FIH anti-doping rules.

The following federation websites have no mention of anti-doping rules: Archery, fencing, football, handball, swimming, rowing, basketball, volleyball, wrestling, table tennis, judo, yachting, equestrian, tennis, triathlon and shooting.

The following have some reference to anti-doping rules though no mention regarding the authority to test etc having been delegated to NADA: Athletics, boxing, cycling, weightlifting and golf.

The following federations have either quoted WADA rules or given links to WADA Code or international federation rules: Canoeing and kayaking and badminton.

Gymnastics, Modern Pentathlon, taekwondo and rugby were not assessed for want of available data in public domain.

Some of the federations do not have any mention at all about doping on their websites while many have fulfilled the requirement ordained by the Sports Ministry in 2015 to include a note on anti-doping as part of its 23-point formula needed for transparency.

The ministry’s points included one that read: “Note on efforts for having dope free sports and compliance to WADA/NADA Code along with details of cases found positive during the last calendar year and action taken thereon.”

The ministry could have instead sought a clear statement on the following lines: “Our federation has incorporated the anti-doping rules of NADA into our constitution. We agree to abide by the anti-doping rules laid down by NADA from time to time and will follow the WADA Code and the anti-doping rules of the International Federation”

There is no need to give an account of the cases of the past year and “action taken thereon” since that should be the responsibility of NADA. A federation can of course provide a list of suspended athletes with duration and dates. But more than all that every federation should be told to upload the WADA Code and Prohibited List and the NADA anti-doping rules.

Anti-doping section needed

Every federation should have a section on its website devoted to anti-doping that may include latest literature on anti-doping, athlete-friendly information like sample-collection procedures, rights and responsibilities of the athletes, formalities involved with filing ‘whereabouts’ information if the athletes are in the registered testing pool of a national body or an international one, hearing procedures in first-instance and appeal stages, information about supplements, anti-doping education material, links to important websites including NADA and WADA and messages from former internationals urging the athletes to stay clean.

Most of the federations have dismissed the Ministry fiat contemptuously, it would seem. Only some of the federations have completed the format of 23 points. On doping some of the points that came out glaringly on checking up websites are:

Yachting Association of India: The federation has reproduced the Ministry’s letter of 26 Feb 2015 asking the federations to upload the 23-point fact-sheet. There is no other mention of meeting the requirements as instructed by the ministry.

National Rifle Association of India: “WADA/NADA compliance: We conducted dope tests during 61st National championships and ISSF World Cup final. No positive case was found.”

All India Tennis Association: “Compliance with WADA as per ITF Guidelines”

Wrestling Federation of India: Has 13 of the points listed. There is no mention of anti-doping! 

Rowing Federation of India: “Regular testing was done during out of competition and in competition. No positive cases were found. Annual report is being submitted to FISA. Regular contact Meetings with the Rowers at every championships.”

It is appalling that a ministry directive of 2015 has been ignored by some of the federations and not fully implemented by many others. It is also unfortunate that at a time when the Internet has become part of our lives, the federations either do not have a section on anti-doping or have outdated rules and practically nothing of use to the athletes in this field.

With doping continuing to show no signs of abating in this country, it is imperative that the IOA and the NSFs make all-out efforts to educate and inform the athletes about the subject. It is also essential to keep the media and the public informed about what the federations are doing. Having outdated anti-doping rules in the constitution will not help no matter how many references a federation might make of other rules in separate, disjointed documents. Having no mention of doping at all in a constitution is something the concerned international federation and the WADA may have to look into.

The understanding of the Ministry and NADA and possibly the IOA and the federations that a Gazette notification in 2010 was adequate to take care of the requirement to have the federations incorporate the anti-doping rules into their governing documents, is erroneous. Even if we accept that nothing more needs to be done in this regard, the federations will ideally have to prominently display an ‘anti-doping’ section on their websites including NADA anti-doping rules and the latter's authority over the entire gamut of domestic testing in all sport, not just a note on “WADA/NADA Code compliance”.

WADA perhaps has realized that not all countries have NADOs that have got the national federations to incorporate their rules. Thus, it has brought in an ‘athlete consent form’ in which the athlete has to accept the WADA rules and agree to subject himself/herself to the jurisdiction and authority of the international federation/national federation/NADO as the case may be.

The IOA and the NSFs have to wake up. More importantly, the ministry has to enforce its 23-point guideline of 2015 to ensure that the information it had sought to be placed in the public domain is actually available on the websites. After nearly four years of the ministry directive, if some of the federations still have information related to 2014-2015 on their websites, it is nothing short of mockery.

Asiad relay squad composition comes into focus (rankings part II)

On the women’s side, Hima Das improved dramatically through the season before settling with a national record of 50.79s for the 400m silver in the Asian Games. With a ranking score of 1215, she was way ahead of the rest of the Indians in the 400m to occupy the 19th slot. Nirmala Sheoran, now under provisional suspension on a doping charge, had 1174 points for the 40th rank while M. R. Poovamma (1121) was joint 92nd.

If one were to exclude the dope-tainted Nirmala, Poovama comes in second in the world rankings among the Indians. Who is third?

That position brings to light the unfair manner in which Jisna Mathew as kept out of the Asian Games relay squad after a hurriedly-convened trial at the games venue. Jisna, ranked 135th (1100) in the world is (was) way above V. K. Vismaya at joint 223rd (1072) and Saritaben Gayakwad at joint 290th (1057). Hima Das, Poovamma, Vismaya and Gayakwad formed the relay team that won the gold in Jakarta.

One can justifiably argue that Vismaya got into the team as the fourth runner in the 4x400 relay as she edged Jisna in the Jakarta trial. But what about Sarita? Why was she not fielded in the trial? Was she so way above or so senior and so established that she could be considered an automatic choice while Jisna, Vismaya, Soniya Baishya and  G. K. Vijayakumari were asked to slug it out on track to fill in the lone slot that was made available in the relay team?

For all the above girls, the timings taken into account for scoring have come prior to the Asian Games. Jisna had 53.32 (final, Asian championships 2017), 53.26 (Asian juniors 2018), 53.18 (heats, Asians 2017), 53.86 (heats, World under-20) and 54.20 (inter-state). Jisna scored 130 placing score for her third place in the Asian championships last year and 40 for her gold in the Asian Juniors this year. Category of a particular meet determines the placing score, the higher the category the more points you gain. Heats and semis do not score.

Vismaya had 53.30 (Gliwice), 53.55 (Wroclaw), 53.52 (Kladno), 53.74 (Jablonec) and 53.88 (Nove Mesto nad Metuji). Vismaya scored a total of 38 points for her placing in four of the meets. In one she scored nothing since that race happened to be a heat.

Gayakwad had 53.24 (Kladno), 53.67 (7th, inter-State), 53.72 (heats, inter-State), 54.31 (Kladno) and 53.87 (6th, Fed Cup). She scored a total of 10 placing points from the meet at Kladno.

It is obvious, Gayakwad’s 53.24 clinched her an automatic place in the relay team. Jisna, P. T. Usha's trainee, was 0.02s slower with her season best. But if that argument were to be given credence, then Vijayakumari had a far better time of 53.03s at the Fed Cup.

Need fair and unbiased selection

If relay teams are finalized on the basis of a season best alone such an imbalance as the one that came about in the Indian team composition in Jakarta is bound to arise. Coaches and the federation have to be fair and impartial in this team selection business at the spot.

Incidentally, Chhavi Sharwat is ranked 215th while Prachi Singh who went to court along with the former questioning their exclusion from the relay squad, and lost the case, is surprisingly not ranked.

In the women’s sprints, Dutee Chand, who bagged two silver medals in the Asian Games, is ranked 59 (100m) and 56 (200m). There is quite a prominent presence of Indian women in the middle and long- distance events, too, with P. U. Chithra (joint 37th in 1500m), L. Suriya (54th in 5000m and 31st in 10,000m) and Sanjivani Jadhav, now under provisional suspension for doping (55th in 5000m, 80th in 10,000m) being the leaders among Indians.

Other creditable Indian rankings:

Men: 3000m steeplechase: Avinash Sable (80); 110m hurdles: Siddhanth Thingalaya (74); High jump: B. Chethan (55); Discus: Dharamraj Yadav (90). 20km walk: K. T. Irfan (41); 50km walk: Sandeep Kumar (38).

Women: 400m hurdles: Anu Raghavan (45), Jauna Murmu (69); 3000m steeplechase: Chinta Yadav (98); Long jump N. V. Neena (29), Nayana James (61); Triple jump: N. V. Sheena (68); Discus: Seema Punia (26), Navjeet Kaur Dhillon (51); Hammer: Sarita Romit Singh (88); Javelin: Annu Rani (40); Heptathlon: Purnima Hembram (48); 20km walk: Khushbir Kaur (35), Ravina (44), Shanti Kumari (64). (National record setter in 2018, Baby Soumya is not ranked in 20km walk probably because at the time of drawing up these lists she did not have the minimum number of competitions).

Come New Year, there will be some minor movements in the rankings. As the year progresses, performances will drop off, some of them will get lesser points depending on how far away they were from the ranking date and some others will bring in new personal bests and better placings in major competitions. 

The Indian season is scheduled to begin in February. But the real test for the Indian athletes will come in the Asian championships in Doha in April when many of them will be under pressure to retain their places and performances achieved in the last Asian meet in Bhubaneswar in order to maintain their rankings.

After having decided to base World Championships qualification this year on rankings, the IAAF has had a change of heart. The old pattern will continue, that is based on of qualification standards, world lists, rankings lists, Area champions qualification etc. However, for the Tokyo Olympics, the world rankings will come into play. A top-60-80 ranking,, depending on the event, will be of help to an athlete in his/her qualification bid. The IAAF is yet to announce the details of the rankings-based qualification system for the Olympics 

Right now, the mood in Indian athletics should be one of celebration notwithstanding the doping cases this year, culminating in five of the international-level athletes being caught in re-tests in Montreal ordered by WADA of samples that had turned up negative in the New Delhi lab. That only showed many of our athletes were escaping detection probably because of lack of more sophisticated equipment at NDTL. The moment such equipment is installed in the lab and our scientists acquire the expertise to use them, the athletes could be in for more shocks!

(Concluded)
Part I here

Six Indian athletes in World top-20

M. Anas is ranked an impressive 19th in the world in the 400m
_Pic courtesy G. Rajaraman

Indian athletics is on the upswing again!

The world rankings, which will come into effect from January 2019, and which are in the testing stage at the moment, show six Indian athletes in the top-20 bracket for 2018.

Javelin thrower Neeraj Chopra is the highest ranked in the rankings up to December 25, 2018, at No.4 in the world, a remarkable achievement for the 21-year-old Indian who broke through only in 2016 with a world junior record (86.48m) and the world under-20 title. Since then, he has not looked back with a series of outstanding performances culminating in the Asian Games gold last August with a personal best and national record of 88.06m.

 Chopra has 1347 points and is behind two Germans, ranked joint No.1, Andreas Hoffmann and Olympic champion Thomas Rohler, both at 1417, and Estonian Magnus Kirt (1374). World champion Johannes Vetter of Germany is at fifth, just seven points behind Chopra. Vetter topped the 2018 season with 92.70m. Hoffmann has thrown over 90 metres four times this season with a best of 92.06m.

Rankings are based on a complicated set of criteria that take into account performance, placing, category of competition etc. The highest category has Olympics and World championships while Area championships (Asian championships for example) are rated higher than Area Games (Asian Games for example).

Diamond League finals will come in the second category followed by a set of IAAF World events plus Diamond League meetings. The average score of five meetings in a 12-month span would be taken into calculations. Points accruing from meets in the previous season would drop off as the new season progresses. (10,000m, road events, racewalking and combined events would be scored over an 18-month period).

Area championship given prominence

Performance in the latest Area championships would be counted irrespective of whether they fall into the ranking period or not. The minimum number of performances in 5000m, 3000m steeplechase and road running events other than marathon is three while in 10,000m, marathon and combined events it is two. In racewalking it is three for 20km and two for 50km.

Apart from Chopra, the other Indians in the top-20 rankings for the year are: Muhammed Anas, 400m (19), Arpinder Singh, triple jump (13); Hima Das, 400m (19), Sudha Singh, 3000m steeplechase (20) and Swapna Barman, heptathlon (15).

This is indicative of the progress made by the Indian athletes over the past year. Not in terms of a solitary, record-breaking performance as it often happened in the past but through consistent performances through the season. Of course, someone like Barman is ranked exceptionally high at 15 thanks to the policy of the IAAF to retain the Asian championships score (5942) of 2017, which is more than a year old, to add to her Asian Games tally of a personal best 6026.

It may be recalled, in 2016, triple jumper Renjith Maheswary was fourth in the world lists (as different from rankings since a single performance in a year could gain an athlete such a distinction) with his 17.30m performance at Bengaluru in the run-up to the Olympic Games. It is a different matter, he could manage only 16.13m in the qualification round in Rio, finishing overall 30th.

The highest ranked Indian in the old IAAF world rankings was long jumper Anu George at fourth, in phases in 2004 and 2005.

In the Olympic year, Neeraj Chopra, with his world junior mark of 86.48m, was 11th among the seniors in the world lists, long jumper Ankit Sharma (8.19m) was 20th and woman steeplechaser Lalita Babar (9:19.76) 13th. They were lists, not rankings which are based on a set of performances rather than a lone mark.

From being around the 75-76-metre bracket in 2010 and 2011, Indian javelin throwers have joined the 80-metre club with Chopra threatening to breach the 90-metre mark. His success has seen a bunch of young javelin throwers striving to reach world standards. So much so, today India has four javelin throwers, other than Chopra, in the top-100 of the world.

Vipin Kasana (47), Rajender Singh Dalvir (59), Sahil Silwal (87) and Shivpal Singh (94) are the other Indian javelin throwers in the 2018 rankings who have got into the top-100. Davinder Singh Kang, the lone Indian to make the World championships final in 2017 also would have been in this list had he been competing but he is under a provisional suspension for doping.

Shivpal Singh (82.28m), Dalvir (90.63m) and Kasana (80.04m), apart from Chopra, have thrown beyond 80 metres this season. It may be mentioned here that Shivpal could manage only a 74.11m for eighth place in the Asian Games.

The throwers in both sections will need to substantially improve their performance in major international meets if Indian athletics has to live up to its new-found stature of having a number of top world-ranked athletes.

The Indian athletes have done exceedingly well on track also this year as can be seen from several of them figuring in the top-100 rankings.

Anas ranked 19th

Right on top of that list comes Muhammed Anas. The 19th rank is an enviable position for the Kerala man who has been bettering the 400m national record regularly since 2016.  He clocked a national record of 45.24s in an all-India race in a meet in the Czech Republic in July last.

Arokia Rajiv, former national record holder, gives Anas company in the top-100, being ranked 54.P. P. Kunhumohammed (183) and Amoj Jacob (187), injured during the relay in the Commonwealth Games, are two other Indian quarter-milers in the top-200.

Jinson Johnson, who bettered Sriram Singh 1976 national record in the 800m (1:45.77) with an awesome 1:45.65 at the Gwahati Inter-State meet, is ranked joint 43rd in the 800m though he could manage only the silver behind team-mate Manjit Singh in the event in the Asian Games. Manjit is at joint 83rd. In the 1500m in which Johnson won the gold in the Asian Games, he is ranked 46. Johnson had bettered Bahadur Prasad’s 1995 mark (3:38.00) in the metric mile with a 3:37.86 for fifth place in the Gold Coast Commonwealth Games.

Ayyasamy Dharun’s progress in the 400m hurdles has been nothing short of spectacular this season. Even when he was far from fit, he had clocked 49.45s for a national record in the Fed Cup at Patiala in March, bettering Joseph Abraham’s 2007 record of 49.51s clocked in the Osaka World championships. He followed that up with another NR of 48.96s for second place in the Asian Games final behind Aberrahmane Samba of Qatar. Dharun is ranked 33.

Depth in hurdles

Interestingly, India has two more athletes in the men’s 400m hurdles rankings who are within the top-100, M. P. Jabir (59) and T. Santhosh Kumar (61). Such talent and depth in an event in which India’s best last year was the 128th place for Santhosh (50.16s) in world lists. Jabir was at 138th place (50.22s) and Dharun (50.81s) at 237th. This year, Santhosh has clocked 49.66 (5th Asian Games) and Jabir 50.02 (Open National). India has two more athletes in the sub-51 bracket this season, Vijay Singh Malik and Jashanjot Singh.

Prominent Indians to be ranked in the field events, apart from Arpinder Singh, included shot putter Tejinder Pal Singh Toor who is 23rd. Toor had a national record of 20.75m for his gold in the Asian Games that fetched him a whopping 1362 performance score. He average a ranking score of 1197 over five meets. He had one other effort of more than 20 metres, 20.24 in the Fed Cup. His slump to 19.37m in the Inter-State at Guwahati was a surprise but he compensated with the national record and gold in Jakarta.

Two of the most promising youngsters to get into the top-50 in the world are high jumper Tejaswain Shankar (35) and long jumper M. Sreeshankar (40) who posted a national record of 8.20m in winding up the season at the Open.

Arpinder Singh scored heavily from the Jakarta Asian Games (16.77m, 1st, 1280 points) and Ostrava Continental Cup (16.59m, 3rd, 1271). He had 16.62m in the Open in Ranchi, 16.46m in CWG and 16.33m in last year’s Asian championships for a highly satisfying 13th rank in the world. Rakesh Babu was 63rd.

(-Contd. Part II)

How did hockey become top priority for NADA after it rated it at No. 12?

Representative pic_Courtesy G. Rajaraman

One of the most curious aspects of anti-doping measures being carried out this year, was the top position hockey had acquired among leading “dopey sports”. Many of us questioned the wisdom of the National Anti-Doping Agency (NADA) in spending its precious resources on a game that had produced just six doping cases through nine years of NADA’s existence, two of them for recreational drugs, while a sport like athletics had churned out 210 and weightlifting 197 (as per available data on the NADA website.)

But NADA had its explanations for why hockey was pushed up the ladder for more tests and, though unconvincing, we had to believe it. It will also have answers ready for overall numbers at the end of the year since it has started adding sample numbers at a furious pace though seemingly there are not many major events around. From a total of 2062 tests by July-end, it has moved to 3188 by Oct-end. Hockey will soon be dumped and athletics brought back into the top of the lists.

In his revealing report in the Indian Express dated 4 November 2018, titled “How NADA rested as athletes trained”, Mihir Vasavda quoted NADA Director-General, Navin Agarwal, as saying hockey was a “very high-risk sport”. The report went onto quote him: “Apart from the psychological impact of doping, points like probability of winning medals and popularity of game in the country are also considered. Hockey ranks very high in both, so the number of tests that were to be conducted as pretty high.”

Hockey in front

Tests up to July-end, 2018 showed hockey had provided 92 samples while athletics had two less. Even if, let us say, hockey was 92 and athletics 100, it still wouldn’t have made sense. At least to those of us who follow sports and, more importantly, follow doping and anti-doping. There were sports like weightlifting (63 samples), boxing (69) and wrestling (70) which should have been high on the “high-risk” chart but were well behind hockey at that point of time.

It was not just a matter of hockey beating athletics by two tests up to July, but several other ‘vulnerable sports’ being downgraded, from an anti-doping perspective, while keeping up this illogical chant about hockey being “high risk” that rankled.

Not unexpectedly, NADA did not keep quiet on the Indian Express report. It put out a “facts and figures” chart on its website in an apparent attempt to rebut the report point by point. It proved a futile attempt to wriggle out of the hole it had dug for itself. (These points were also discussed in a two-part blog piece here).

On hockey, this is what NADA said on its website: “Scientific assessment of various risk parameters such as strength, endurance, popularity etc, form the basis of determining the numbers to be tested. Hockey is now getting more funding in India and has become high in popularity with probability of medal winning; all these have moved it up in our risk assessment and thereby increase in the numbers to be tested.”

Now the goalposts were widened. From “probability of winning medals and popularity of the game”, the point about “funding” was added.

Since many of the arguments that the NADA DG put forward in the newspaper report centred around the regulations, guidelines and prescribed parameters of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), a set of questions were posed through e-mail to the Montreal-based agency in an effort to get a better idea about “risk assessment”.

Of course, “risk assessment” as WADA has explained in its reply to me, and as most of us knew previously, and had tweeted about, is based on Article 4.2.1 of the International Standards for Testing and Investigations.

What is 'risk assessment'

WADA quoted the rules below to re-emphasize what “risk assessment” was in a recent communication:

“As set out in Code Article 5.4, the starting point of the Test Distribution Plan must be a considered assessment, in good faith, of which Prohibited Substances and/or Prohibited Methods are most likely to be abused in the sport(s) and sport discipline(s) in question.

This assessment should take into account (at a minimum) the following information:

a) The physical and other demands of the relevant sport(s) (and/or discipline(s) within the sport(s)), considering in particular the physiological requirements of the sport(s)/sport discipline(s);

b) The possible performance-enhancing effects that doping may elicit in such sport(s)/sport discipline(s);

c) The rewards available at the different levels of the sport(s)/sport discipline(s) and/or other potential incentives for doping;

d) The history of doping in the sport(s)/sport discipline(s);

e) Available research on doping trends (e.g., peer-reviewed articles);

f) Information received/intelligence developed on possible doping practices in the sport (e.g., Athlete testimony; information from criminal investigations; and/or other intelligence developed in accordance with WADA's Guidelines for Cordinating Investigations and Sharing Anti-Doping Information and Evidence in accordance with Section 11.0 of the International Standard for Testing and Investigations; and

g) The outcomes of previous test distribution planning cycles.”

NADA also probably knew these rules. But one had to pose a few specific questions to get more clarity. So, one asked and got the answers (WADA’s answers in Italics and blue):

Q: Did WADA suggest any particular grading for sports disciplines to be categorized as per “risk assessment” after it did the last audit of Indian NADO?

 The NADO was asked to focus on high risk sports and athletes participating in upcoming major events, for example the Commonwealth Games, Asian Games and World Championships.

Q: What was the order of priority suggested by WADA, if any, for sports to be considered in grading “risk assessment” as far as Indian anti-doping efforts were concerned? If no particular grading was suggested, then what was the grading provided by the Indian NADO after the WADA audit? Where did hockey figure in that grading?

 Hockey is ranked 12^th in the list of sports in India in terms of doping risk as contained in NADA’s Risk Assessment.

So, hockey was ranked 12th only in that “risk assessment” exercise. By NADA and no one else. Yet, NADA DG and his agency repeatedly tried to give the impression that hockey indeed was “high risk” and they had to consider so many factors while drawing up their priorities, all as per WADA guidelines.

NADA might have gone after hockey to boost numbers easily since the players are bunched together at one camp. But it obviously did not want to concede that point or the one about athletics and weightlifting numbers being down instead of going considerably up with Asian Games round the corner.

Q: Where did the following sports disciplines figure in that grading: Athletics, weightlifting, wrestling, boxing, cycling, swimming, powerlifting, bodybuilding?

All were identified in the top 10 sports based on the risk factors applied out of 63 sport disciplines assessed.

  

Another topic that keeps coming up these days is the number of samples being tested by NADA every year. So, it was prudent to ask the following question:

Q: Has WADA given a target of sample numbers to the Indian NADO for the year 2018? If so, how many?

WADA does not provide a target number for NADOs to meet. 

The Test Distribution Plan (TDP) should reflect the risk assessment and the level of testing among the sports and athletes identified to be “at a higher risk” than others. 

The ISTI requires that the majority of tests are conducted out of competition (OOC). Note that the TDP is a living document and not a static one, it is intended to be an ongoing process that changes based on variations within the athletes competing in the sports identified.

The TDP should be amended based on risk factors, test results, information/intelligence received, athlete performance, Athlete Biological Passport (ABP) profiles etc.

Missing RTP athletes altogether at crucial period

NADA missed testing out-of-competition plenty of athletes in its Registered Testing Pool in the run-up to the Asian Games. NADA, however, keeps denying that many were missed. It has even suggested that during the rest of the year it would complete the minimum three tests on such athletes. Like its drive towards a target of 3500 tests a year this is another farce it goes through, test RTP athletes a few times after the major championships of the season are over.

 In this context, a question was put to WADA:

 Is it all right to miss testing athletes listed in the Registered Testing Pool in out-of-competition testing altogether for a year?

Following the risk assessment outlined above, such high profile/risk athletes identified should be part of an RTP which requires the NADO to plan to test the Athletes a minimum of three times OOC per year.

The one point which WADA seemed to agree with NADA was the need to limit in-competition samples even from major championships.

Q: When WADA expects more out-of-competition tests than in-competition in a sport like athletics there is a possibility of the NADO cutting down in-competition numbers, say from 1000 to 400 in order to meet the OOC requirements which may lead to a complete mockery of testing in-competition. This is what we have started witnessing in India, either skip an athletics meet altogether or else collect just 20 or 30 samples. Would WADA suggest a remedy?

As outlined above, testing at the same event becomes predictable. Therefore, reducing test numbers at a particular event and using the resources to test an event not normally tested is a good way to spread the effectiveness of a program and to instill some levels of unpredictability to athletes.

One cannot agree with either the NADA policy or the WADA argument here. NADA has been spreading out its testing to all sorts of events in all types of sports, and when it comes to an Asian Games selection meet like this year’s Inter-State at Guwahati, if the numbers are down to 40 or 60, athletes and coaches do ask the question: But who are being tested? When adequate out-of-competition tests are also not done, and NADA keeps sending teams to test at state-level meets and college meets, this question gains a different connotation.

NADA and WADA need to understand that in the Indian context, an Olympic qualification in a majority of cases is the ultimate aim for a track and field athlete and the so-called selection trials have to be strictly put through the anti-doping grind. This should not mean that the out-of-competition testing programme could be diluted. That should remain the main plank on which NADA directs its anti-doping efforts.

With the latest developments related to WADA re-testing some of the samples it took custody of last September and five track and field athletes and a weightlifter being caught in the dope net, there is all the more reason for NADA to be more vigilant in the coming season when athletics will have the Asian championships and the World Championships in Doha.

NADA has to shed its philosophy “we don’t want to bother athletes again and again” and eventually not test them at all out-of-competition through a crucial period of their preparations. NADA needs experts to determine its RTP and Test Distribution Plan and a sincere effort to take on its primary task_keep dope cheats away.

What NADA testing figures reveal (part II)

Muhammed Anas and Arokia Rajiv at the Asian championships
in Bhubaneswar in 2017. NADA did not test both in its
out-of-competition testing this season. Photo_courtesy G. Rajaraman

Are athletes getting tested by NADA 10 times a year?

Hockey getting highlighted in this debate has unwittingly overshadowed the farcical out-of-competition or 'whereabouts'-based testing in athletics, something that this journalist has pointed out through the years.

It is not the numbers alone that matter in this anti-doping exercise. It has been made clear by NADA officials including the Director-General in the recent past that it is the “quality” of testing that matters and not mere number of samples . We have to agree with this assessment of course.

But when the number of samples collected in athletics keep sliding (see chart below) despite the sport occupying either the No 1 or 2 slot among the dopers in the country, one has to wonder what exactly could be the modus operandi. Is it an attempt to show lesser ‘positive’ since the higher authorities are concerned that India ranks high among the dopers? Or is it an attempt to prove that the awareness campaign that NADA had pursued with extra vigour through the past few years has started paying off?

See the way the sample numbers in athletics have dwindled through the years. From a record of 1000-odd samples from 2012 through to 2016, it was cut down to 800-plus in 2017 and now looks headed towards a target of around 600-700.

The NADA DG is, as always, optimistic about touching the target of 3500 total samples by the year-end though the last count was 2062 only. Athletics accounted for just 362 samples out of that, 90 of them in out-of-competition tests. We have to keep in mind that an athletics championship will normally involve anything from 44 to 47 events. It would be foolish to say, "we will collect 20 samples and be done with it."

After having collected around 50 samples at the National Inter-State meet in Guwahati in June that acted as the final selection trials for the Asian Games in Jakarta-Palembang, NADA is learnt to have touched the 75-sample mark at the Open National at Bhubaneswar in September.

That was of no great importance from a broader perspective except for boosting numbers since a large number of top athletes skipped the meet, and the prime focus this season, Commonwealth Games and the Asian Games, was already behind us. Today, as NADA gets ready to boost numbers, the athletics season is over.

NADA talked about targeted testing at the Guwahati inter-State meet, indicating that in-competition testing had also become something of an out-of-competition testing format. It is fine to target athletes in a competition, but when you miss the medal winners, sometimes all of them in many events, the trust that the rest of the athletes have in the system evaporates. At least, do not announce on the opening day “we are here to collect 50-60 samples” as it happened at Guwahati.

Boosting testing numbers through institutional meets or Khelo India would not serve the main purpose of an anti-doping programme_test athletes at the elite level, provide a level-playing field to national-level athletes who are aspiring to represent the country in the Olympics.

NADA started its Registered Testing Pool sometime during the month of May 2015. To begin with it had around 41 track and field athletes in that pool. No other sport was there in the RTP. In due course, weightlifting was added and then, gradually, other sports.

By February 2016 that list was updated and a further updated list, rather unwieldy, was published in November 2017 which lasted up to May 2018.  The athletes’ component drastically shrunk from 64 in 2017 to 25 in 2018. That was the first indication that NADA would not be going all out to test track and field athletes out-of-competition in the important year of the Commonwealth Games and the Asian Games.

The crux of the strategy, it seemed, was to cut down on numbers and thus get lesser number of positive tests in order to avoid the No. 3 status (No 6 later on) that the country enjoyed among dopers from 2013 to 2015. The earlier plans of reaching up to 7000 samples a year seem to have been given up.

The AFI chief, Adille Sumariwalla, is a staunch anti-doping campaigner in his statements. He has argued these past few weeks on Twitter that dope-testing was strict in training camps, testers land up in camps every other day and test athletes and those outside are prone to doping since they do not get tested that much.

One has argued, in vain, that mere claim of athletes in camps being tested “every other day” would be of no help unless we come to know who were tested, how many times each and when all.

Now, we have the answers. And they are revealing, if not startling, as was to be expected only.

It now turns out that even those listed in the Registered Testing Pool of NADA are rarely tested. Thirty-two of the 64 RTP athletes from the 2017 batch were not tested at all, according to Mihir Vasavda. Of the 25 in the May 2018 list, eight were not tested at all!

NADA strategy

Talking to Vasavda, one could get a fair idea about the testing strategy adopted by NADA. The policy of late has been “we don’t want to harass the athletes, we will go by our risk assessment.” That has apparently allowed the athletes the time and space in case they were interested in something that the higher-ups in the AFI say they are not even familiar with!

Forget the RTP for a moment. Try to assess the significance of the following testing account:

The country’s top quarter-miler, Muhammed Anas, who improved upon his own national record twice this season (45.31s and 45.24s), was not tested out-of-competition even once by NADA! He was indeed tested at Patiala during the Federation Cup and at Guwahati on the day he won the 200m in the Inter- State championships. It must be mentioned here that Anas has been in the IAAF/AIU RTP till recently and could have been expected to be tested by the latter. That should not mean that there is a bar on NADA testing him or there was no need for NADA to test him.

(Like Anas, two other Indian athletes who were in the IAAF/AIU RTP this season, Asiad champion shot putter Tejinder Pal Singh Toor and woman long jumper Nayana James (PB 6.55m) were also not tested out-of-competition by NADA. We will know how many times they were tested by AIU only when it publishes annual testing statistics sometime early next year.)

Arokia Rajiv, the No. 2 Indian in the 400m, was also not tested out-of-competition even once during this season! NADA has attempted to classify his test at Patiala on March 6 as “out of competition” but that happened to be the day on which he competed in the heats and final of the 400m which he eventually finished fourth (47.02s). There is no method by which NADA or any other agency can convert an in-competition test, done on the day of the event, into an out-of-competition one.

Rajiv was also tested at the Guwahati Inter-State where he won the 400m (45.78s SB). Between March 6 (Patiala) and June 29 (Guwahati) Rajiv was not tested. Nor is there a record of any test by NADA post-June 29.

Why Rajiv or for that matter many others including Anas, training at Jablonec, Czech Republic, were not tested by NADA towards the end of July, when it carried out a few tests in Europe, with less than a month to go for the Asian Games, will put a question mark over NADA's intentions.

One test towards the end of July

Many of the athletes who eventually made it into the Indian team for the Asian Games were either not tested at all out-of-competition or else tested right at the end of July alone with Asian Games athletics competitions scheduled to start at Jakarta on Aug 25.

Surprisingly, Haryana’s Nirmala Sheoran, who has this habit of springing up just in time for a major selection meet and then disappearing, was tested only once during the season, in-competition at the Guwahati inter-State where she clocked her personal best 51.25s for the 400m while taking the silver behind Hima Das (51.13s). Hima went onto improve it to 50.79s for the silver in the Asian Games. Like in the case of many others, NADA had the chance (in tests outsourced to national agencies) to test Nirmala at Jablonec but it did not. Hima was tested four times in all including once out-of-competition. The in-competition tests included two in Guwahati within the space of two days.

Among those tested while in Europe were: P. P. Kunhumohammed, Ayyasamy Dharun and K. S. Jeevan and Hima Das, M. R. Poovamma, V. K. Vismaya, Saritaben Gayakwad and Anu Raghavan, all 400m runners or 400m hurdlers.

Those who underwent two out-of-competition tests during the season included Kunhumohammed, Saritaben Gayakwad, V. K. Vismaya, Anu Raghavan and Purnima Hembram (heptathlon).

Swapna Barman tested once in competition

Incidentally, Swapna Barman, whose sensational heptathlon gold in the Asian Games despite a variety of aches and pains that caught the attention of the national and international media and prompted shoe companies and sponsors to queue up before her home, was tested only once. That was in-competition at Guwahati where she took the second place behind Hembram to gain selection for the games.

Whether between an in-competition test and an out-of-competition test or between two out-of-competition tests, athletes generally had a gap of around three to four-and-a-half months! And this NADA called its out-of-competition test distribution plan that apparently had the approval of WADA since it was designed on the basis of “revised risk assessment” etc.

Top 16 do not figure in RTP

Just imagine, NADA’s Registered Testing Pool in athletics did not contain a single runner from the top-16 this year in women’s 400m! The 17th, Anilda Thomas, who had a best of 54.33s in the only national meet she competed in this season, Indian GP at Patiala in February, was retained apparently on the strength of her previous two years’ performances.

We all know the women’s 400m had been in focus of the authorities since the 2010 Commonwealth Games at home. It had always been of course but the CWG brought into focus a bunch of women who could captivate the audience with their 'splendid running'. Six of them were caught for doping next year and the enthusiasm died down a bit before being revived prior to the Rio Olympic Games.

Neither the AFI nor the Sports Authority of India (SAI) would seem to have given up hopes of an Olympic medal through the women’s 4x400m relay team. In that background, how do you explain the top 16 women this season being ignored for the NADA RTP? Or the top two runners in the 4x400m line-up, Hima and Poovamma, being tested just once each out-of-competition towards the end of July?

Among those who did not undergo out-of-competition tests this season but were part of at least the Asian Games squad were: Gold medallists at the Asian Games, middle distance runners Jinson Johnson and Manjit Singh; distance runners Sanjivani Jadhav and L. Suriya; racewalkers K. T. Irfan and Manish Rawat; javelin thrower Shivpal Singh and long jumper N. V. Neena. In fact, Neena, after one in-competition test in February was not tested at all, in-competition or out, through the rest of the season! And she happens to be in the NADA RTP and she was training in India!
Asian Games bronze-winning discus thrower Seema Antil Punia was tested out-of-competition once on 8 March. After that there was no test at all. She was exempted from the Inter-State selection meet and was in Russia towards her final preparations for the Asian Games. Seema is an athlete in the NADA RTP.
Asian Games silver-winning steeplechaser Sudha Singh was also tested once out-of-competition in March. She was then tested during the inter-State in June.
In its enthusiasm to beef up out-of-competition numbers, NADA tested athletes at meet venues a day before the competition. A case in point was Asian Games triple jump champion Arpinder Singh. He was tested out-of-competition on March 7, a day before his competition in the Fed Cup which he won (16.61m). He was never tested out-of-competition for the rest of the season. There was one in-competition test at Guwahati at the inter-State meet.

Mere claims

Despite a claim by NADA that it had tested Indian middle distance-long-distance runners at Thimphu, it seems no tests were carried out by NADA in Bhutan.

There is an oft-repeated claim by the higher-ups in NADA that the same athletes are being tested “10 to 20 times” during a year. “We have only about 100-odd sportspersons who compete at the Olympics, World championships and the big events. How many times in a year will you test them after testing the same persons 10-20 times in a year?” a NADA official was quoted as saying in a news report in July last.

Now, we know they are not even being tested three times out-of-competition  or, as in some cases, not even once.

Test them at least three times out-of-competition in a season as rules demand. There is no need to keep counting the in-competition tests since that would depend entirely on an athlete winning a medal.  Even that cannot be more than three-four during a season, especially when NADA is collectng 40-50 samples from a meet. Instead of targeting an athlete during competition which of course could be done, the best option would be to test your RTP athletes.

Contrary to what the NADA DG has explained in the Express report, out-of-competition testing need not depend on ADAMS or RTP or the Internet. NADA does not need any permission to test an athlete out-of-competition. It can test him/her at any time, any place during a season during the 6 a.m-11 p.m time slot. And in India that becomes easy in athletics at least since the majority of them are together at camps most of the time. The same batch of dope-testers who are supposed to be roaming around the NIS campus or South campus in Bengaluru every other day, can ask camp authorities to call athletes and test them, RTP or not, internet or not. The same way, NADA need not have the ADAMS-entered "whereabouts" information about athletes training abroad. Seek that from the SAI_they should know of course_ and plan a "mission". Athletes are most unlikely to "escape" to nearby countries fearing a raid though once a large batch of them packed up and left South Africa in a hurry when testers went looking for them!
Of course, NADA will have to spend some additional money to get those training in the Czech Republic, Poland, Bhutan, Oman, Kazakhstan or Azerbaijan tested. Not just once in a four-month period but twice or thrice.
Out-of-competition (OOC) testing is the bedrock on which anti-doping measures are normally mounted. If the OOC tests are spaced out intelligently, athletes would find it difficult to complete 'cycles' of doping, as per theory. (Micro-dosing, that of taking small doses of banned drugs to avoid detection, is a method athletes adopt to counter OOC testing). If you provide three to four months to an athlete in between two tests, he or she would have achieved whatever was there to achieve. Athletes evade testers when they know they are likely to test positive. That is where the Registered Testing Pool comes in. Athletes in the pool have to provide their 'whereabouts' to the anti-doping agency so that the latter would be able to keep tabs on athletes through the course of a year. A one-hour slot, for 365 days a year, at a designated place of the athlete's choice has to be kept aside for this purpose by the athlete. Three 'missed tests' can attract a sanction of up to two years.

NADA should try to update its RTP at least once in three months. Despite having been injured and not having competed since the Commonwealth Games, 400m runner Amoj Jacob is still part of the RTP. So is Tintu Luka whose last competition was the  Asian championships in Bhubaneswar in July 2017! She came down with dengue there and then developed a foot injury that did not heal enough for her to come back this season.

Javelin thrower Devender Singh Kang had tested positive a second time in February this year and is under provisional suspension but he too is in the RTP. High hurdler Siddhanth Thingalaya also finds a place in the RTP despite not having performed up to par for more than a year. Moreover he is practically based in the US.

Keeping steeplechaser Lalita Babar who made the Rio Olympics final, in the NADA RTP during a season when she competed in just one cross-country race after a year's break, also was illogical. Viewed from the angle that NADA does not want too many athletes in its list probably because of financial constraints, it has to utilize the list to maximum effect rather than pack it with inactive athletes.

Let us give up this “athletes are tested every other day” stance. Let us also avoid this "we don't want to hound them" business. Let us get down seriously to test them out-of-competition. Credibility of Indian athletics is at stake no matter that the Asian Games euphoria is yet to die down.

(Concluded)
Part I is here
(Updated Nov 9, 2018)

What NADA testing figures reveal (Part I)

NADA has targeted hockey this season. Photo_Courtesy G. Rajaraman.

Is hockey a ‘high-risk’ sport in anti-doping parlance?

“Hockey is a very high-risk sport” in an anti-doping perspective! It takes a while before one can even attempt to understand this statement.

Hockey and doping?

One has followed anti-doping closely for about two decades but has never come across the game being rated as a top “doping sport”.

Read through this revealing report by Mihir Vasavda in the Indian Express and you start thinking you have been unfair in categorizing sport like athletics, weightlifting, cycling, swimming, wrestling and boxing etc as “high risk” or “most vulnerable” sports from a doping perspective. Hockey has to figure somewhere in between. At least NADA’s yardstick demands such a grouping.

The Express report quoted the NADA Director-General, Navin Agarwal, to say that as per revised risk assessment parameters, “based on WADA guidelines,” hockey was a “very high-risk sport”.

“Apart from the physiological impact of doping, points like probability of winning medals and popularity of game in the country are also considered. Hockey ranks very high in both, so the number of tests that were to be conducted was pretty high,” Agarwal was quoted as saying.

According to the figures given out by NADA in response to an RTI application by Mihir Vasavda/Indian Express, NADA carried out 92 out-of-competition tests in hockey compared to 90 in athletics, 70 in wrestling, 64 in cycling, 62 in weightlifting and 61 in boxing for the period January-July 2018.

It is difficult to believe that NADA’s out-of-competition criteria has been based on WADA guidelines as claimed by its DG. Even if we accept they were indeed based on WADA guidelines, how could WADA arrive at a conclusion that NADA needed to concentrate more on a team sport like hockey rather than on individual sports and perennial toppers in doping like athletics, weightlifting, cycling, wrestling, boxing etc?

If we take the anti-doping rule violations (ADRVs) compiled by WADA, from 2014 to 2016 in Olympic sports, we can find that hockey figures low down in the list. For 2014, hockey is at joint 18th place with equestrian sport with four ADRVs, for 2015 it is joint 22nd with golf with four ADRVs and for 2016 it is joint 22nd with four other sports (modern pentathlon, badminton, table tennis and equestrian sport) with four ADRVs. (The 2017 figures are yet to be out but WADA’s testing figures show hockey has eight positive tests including one in indoor hockey from 1476 samples)

The ADRV toppers in these years (Olympic sports): 2014: Athletics 248, Cycling 168, weightlifting 143, football 69, wrestling 56, boxing 49, rugby 40, aquatics 32, basketball 27. 2015: Athletics 240, weightlifting 239, cycling 200, football 108, rugby 80, boxing 66, wrestling 57, basketball 39, rowing 27, aquatics 26. 2016: Athletics 205, cycling 165, weightlifting 116, football 79, wrestling 64, rugby 56, aquatics 35, boxing 35, canoeing and kayaking 29, basketball 27.

(The ADRVs are cases confirmed as violations. All adverse analytical findings (AAFs) need not end up in  ADRVs nor can the figures given out be treated as final since cases may be pending).

In a list of 839 cases available on the NADA website as of 29 Oct 2018, as disposed of by the Anti-Doping Disciplinary Panel, hockey figures at the 15th slot with six cases, two of them for marijuana and one for a stimulant. In 2018, the last case was that of goalkeeper Akash Chikte who has been banned for two years for a steroid violation. There was one other case in 2018, also of a steroid violation, that ended in a four-year sanction.

This is not in defence of hockey as a “clean sport” nor an argument against either NADA’s policy or WADA’s guidelines, but an attempt at figuring out what prompts authorities to categorize a sport as “most vulnerable” from a doping angle, or classify certain sports as “high-risk sport”, “priority sport” etc.

If “probability of winning medals” is taken as a criterion for increased number of testing, then athletics should have figured high in the Asian Games context. Not only did it offer the highest number of medals (theoretically, 89 medals in all if we take into consideration two athletes in each event are permitted to be entered under the rules in 22 men and 21 women’s events plus a team each in four relays and one mixed relay), but its record also showed that it topped the all-time medals tally for India with 253. Wrestling comes next with 59.

Hockey, on the other hand, offered only a medal each in men and women’s sections for a country. India managed only a silver (women) and bronze (men) in the recent edition. India has won 21 hockey medals in all in the Asian Games. One should not be forgetting kabaddi also in the Asian Games context despite the reverses India had in the last edition.

Similarly, weightlifting has brought India plenty of medals in the Commonwealth Games, just as wrestling and shooting have also done.

It is learnt, hockey figured only in the 12th place in the ‘rankings’ based on WADA parameters and yet found itself on top of the list when it came to testing by NADA during 2018. How this happened is a mystery.

As highlighted in the Express report, weightlifter Satish Sivalingam who won the gold in the Commonwealth Games in April was not tested by NADA before that. He was tested only in July. More interestingly, NADA did zero test in March in the run-up to CWG and just two tests out-of-competition in July, prior to the Asian Games in weightlifting.

(Contd. Part II)