In a shocking news just breaking online, it has emerged that shot putter Inderjeet Singh, an integral part of the Indian contingent to Rio Olympics and a medal hopeful, has failed his latest dope test. This comes on the back of previous doping allegations lodged against Narsingh Yadav, another prominent athlete and potential medalist.
According to well-placed sources, the shot putter’s A sample has been found positive for a banned substance and the National Anti-Doping Agency (NADA) has notified the athlete and the Athletics Federation of India (AFI) about the failed dope test. The athlete has a week’s time to report to NADA and seek a test of his B sample. NADA had collected his sample on June 24. According to sources, the doping is due to the administration of some ‘fancy-sounding’ drug, although the name could not be ascertained.
Inderjeet had been one of the first Olympic athletes to qualify for India in the upcoming Olympic Games. Having been the gold medalist Asian champions, Asian Grand Prix and the World University Games last year, he also won the Bronze medal at the Incheon Games thus cementing his place in the list of medal hopefuls. He even finished second place in the Indian Grand Prix earlier this year in spite of a shoulder injury.
Having been registered by NADA for its testing pool, Inderjeet had allegedly been ‘avoiding’ getting tested by the agency.
Sources inside Nada said, "We were doubting something was wrong when we came to know about him avoiding the NADA tests. Our worst fears have come true."
Inderjeet had travelled to the US to train in the hope of breaching the 21m barrier. It is suspected that he might have picked up contact with the banned substances of performance-enhancing drugs there.
Having said all these it would be premature to give a knee-jerk reaction to this since only one sample has been proved to be faulty. The Narsingh-fiasco has everyone on their nerves and it would be unfair to transfer that anger or disappointment to this case. We can only hope that the second sample comes clean and he is acquitted.
