CHENNAI: Even as the Anti-Doping Bill has been submitted in the Parliament, India are up for another big doping embarrassment yet again. The country that had been topping the world charts, has now seen a huge spike in positive cases. The number in 2024 stands at 260. This could be the highest number of positive doping cases in the country. This was revealed during a question hour session (Unstarred question No - 2231) in the Rajya Sabha. India's testing agency is National Anti-Doping Agency (NADA). Most of the athletes are all national and international level players.
This after the International Olympic Committee (IOC) had pointed out to Indian Olympic Association of its high number of doping positive cases and its subsequent impact on its Olympic 2036 bid. India have been topping the charts in the World Anti-Doping Agency figures both testing as well as Anti-Doping Rule Violation (ADRV). India are already among the top nations when it comes to doping by junior athletes as well. However, the latest figure released by the ministry during the question hour could be the highest. Before this, the highest number stood at 225 in 2019.
Rajya Sabha MP Imran Pratapgarhi asked the sports minister "whether Government is aware of the rising number of anti-doping rule violations involving Indian athletes in recent years; (b) number of athletes who tested positive for banned substances in the years 2021 to 2024, year-wise and sport-wise..."
In reply, the sports minister said that the government is aware of "instances of anti-doping rule violations involving Indian athletes in recent years and is fully committed to curb the menace of doping in sports."
The sports ministry's response stated that in 2024, there have been 260 positive cases, a sizeable jump from 213 in 2023. The samples tested in 2024 stood at 7466 and even this could be among the highest.
Among the sports, once again athletics topped the list with 76 positive cases in 2024. This will be another headache for the Athletics Federation of India that has seen some top athletes testing positive in recent times both at home and abroad. One must take into consideration that athletics is one event that generates a high number of participants in events. Close behind is weightlifting with 43 positive cases in 2024, a considerable jump from 38 in 2023. Wrestling is another sport that has seen a very high number of positive cases — 29 in 2024.
Boxing is another sport that is witnessing a rise in positive cases. The sport had 17 positive cases in 2024, almost double the figure of 2023 that stood at 9. This must be an area of grave concern for the sport that had not seen cases in double figures until 2024.
This comes weeks after the World Anti Doping Agency (WADA) published both their dope Testing Report (2023) and Anti-Doping Rule Violation statistics for the year 2021.
The WADA 2023 Anti-Doping Testing Figures indicates that India had the maximum number of positive cases in terms of numbers and percentage. According to the report, the National Dope Testing Laboratory (NDTL) had tested 5412 urine samples out of which 212 returned positive while 477 blood samples had two adverse analytical findings (which is the number of positive tests before final adjudication — Anti-Doping Rule Violation).
Going by the outcome of the testing agency report, there were 120 ADRVs after 125 failed dope tests (Adverse Analytical Finding) in 2022. According to the WADA executive report, Russia topped with 164 ADRVs while Italy followed India with 104.