Stick to the Code

It has now become fashionable to talk of “strictest action” and “zero tolerance” when it comes to doping instances in India.

“We will deal with such cases sternly” or “we do not tolerate such practice” are common refrains.

No one tolerates it in the world. Not openly any way!

The latest expression of an Indian official towards asserting his or his organisation’s ‘zero tolerance’ suggests sanctions beyond the scope of the rules. It also exceeds the powers of the organization itself.

The context here is the ‘positive’ test returned by India’s para powerlifter Sachin Chaudhary that forced him to return to the country from Glasgow where he was part of the Commonwealth Games contingent.

Initially withdrawn on the pretext of his father being ill, it turned out that he had tested positive in an out-of-competition test done by the National Anti-Doping Agency (NADA) in India.

Now, at least one official of the Paralympic Committee of India (PCI) is making statements to confirm the violation. Unfortunately he is also going beyond his brief to threaten a life ban on the athlete.

The threat

"Sachin`s dope sample taken by the NADA on June 23 was found to be positive for a banned substance and now he will give his B sample. We will take a decision after the result of B sample comes. We don`t tolerate doping by our athletes," PCI Secretary J Chandrasekhar told PTI.

"Surely, we will punish him and we are even thinking of slapping a life ban on him," said Chandrasekhar, though it is not known whether an athlete can be handed a straight life ban on his first dope offence, the PTI report said.

Sport is played or conducted as per rules. Doping sanctions are also as per rules. There is a process that has to be gone through. An athlete is given an opportunity to explain the ‘positive’ result. A hearing panel listens to arguments on behalf of the athlete as well as the prosecuting agency before arriving at a decision. It goes strictly by the World Anti Doping Agency (WADA) Code.

And there is no life ban for a first offence under the Code for an adverse analytical finding.

Even in the case of “aggravating circumstances” under the 2009 Code, the punishment is double that of the standard sanction of two years.

PCI has to follow rules

The PCI is an affiliate of the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) which in turn is a WADA Code signatory. If the IPC follows the Code, then it becomes mandatory for the PCI to follow it.

In India, the NADA conducts all dope tests, processes all doping charges and brings forward cases before the National Anti-Doping Disciplinary Panel (NADDP). The panel, chaired by retired judge Dinesh Dayal, after hearings, decides on the quantum of punishment. A steroid offence does not necessarily get the maximum sanction. A case by case evaluation is made by the panels.

If any of the parties concerned does not agree with the decision and wishes to challenge it, there is a National Anti Doping Appeal Panel (NADAP) where an appeal can be filed.

‘International-level’ athletes have to file their appeal with the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), the Lausanne-based court that deals with sports-related cases. The definition of ‘international-level’ is determined by the rules of the concerned International Federation.

Right of appeal

Once decisions are handed out and conveyed to the respective organizations in India by NADA (or by the International Federation as the case may be in instances where the International Federation would have directly handled a case reported in an international competition or in an out-of-competition test conducted by it), the athlete gets an opportunity to file an appeal.

The federations have no say in the conduct of tests or in the quantum of sanctions. They also do not have the right of appeal (as per NADA rules) while the International Federations, NADA and the WADA have that right, apart from the athlete.

It may be recalled, in 2005, following the Athens Olympics doping scandal the Indian weightlifting federation and the Indian Olympic Association had banned lifters Sanamacha Chanu and Sunaina Anand for life along with coach Pal Singh Sandhu.

(Sunaina’s happened to be a case unrelated to the Olympics while in Athens the second lifter to test positive was Pratima Kumari. She approached the court then and thus the initial decision pertained to the other two lifters).

WADA reminder in Chanu's case

A reminder from WADA that while it appreciated the IOA’s tough stand against doping, there was a need to follow rules and those rules mandated only a maximum of two years sanction led to the IOA lifting the life ban. (Chanu is currently serving an eight-year ban, having committed a second offence in 2010).

WADA has, in other cases in other countries also, stepped in to correct ‘arbitray’ life bans or bans for excessive periods outside the purview of the Code.

Thus it would be prudent to be on the side of the Code for the PCI rather than contemplate life ban on any athlete. More importantly, it should allow the process to get completed and wait for NADA to intimate the decision, whether about provisional suspension or a lengthier sanction after a proper hearing.

And this simple philosophy should apply to all such National Federations in India which keep talking of “zero tolerance” and “we will be tough” stuff.

“We suspend them immediately” is another oft-heard refrain in such cases. An immediate suspension is a provisional suspension imposed by NADA and enforced by the federation concerned.  The federations on their own do not have the right to impose it since before it is imposed an athlete has to be given a provisional hearing which is the responsibility of the testing authority, in this case NADA.

“We did not spare anyone who was found doping” is another common refrain. The federations do not get a chance to spare anyone under the NADA regime or the Code. The hearing panels, where the federations (at least most of them) do not even bother to attend proceedings, decide on the quantum of sanctions.

Rhetoric is fine when it appears in print or on the web or is heard on TV. It might have no relevance when appropriate bodies take up cases and deal with them.