International women athletes, shot-putter Manpreet Kaur and javelin thrower Suman Devi, have been handed a four-year ban by the National Anti Doping Agency (NADA) after being caught for doping in 2017, an Athletics Federation of India official said on Tuesday.
The Punjab shot-putter, who returned positive results an extraordinary four times, can appeal before NADA’s Anti Doping Appeal Panel for reduction of her punishment. The ban will be imposed with retrospective effect. Her suspension will start from July 20, 2017, as per a NADA order dated March 29.
The Olympian will lose the Asian championships gold she won at Bhubaneswar in 2017 as well as medals won in domestic competitions, from the time the first urine sample that returned an adverse finding was collected.
Suman Devi tested positive for anabolic steroid nandrolone during the national trials held in Patiala from June 25-27. The 32-year-old thrower from Uttar Pradesh finished 10th with a throw of 50.90m, way below her personal best of 59.45m achieved while winning gold in the 2016 South Asian Federation Games.
Manpreet, 28, had won at Bhubaneswar with a best effort of 18.28m. She later qualified for the 2017 World Championships in London, but was dropped from the Indian squad. Manpreet’s first positive test, for anabolic steroid metenolone, came in the first leg of the 2017 Asian Grand Prix at Jinhua, China. Her winning throw there was 18.86m, a national record, which will now be erased.
{{/usCountry}}Manpreet, 28, had won at Bhubaneswar with a best effort of 18.28m. She later qualified for the 2017 World Championships in London, but was dropped from the Indian squad. Manpreet’s first positive test, for anabolic steroid metenolone, came in the first leg of the 2017 Asian Grand Prix at Jinhua, China. Her winning throw there was 18.86m, a national record, which will now be erased.
{{/usCountry}}Manpreet’s string of positive tests – Indian athletics has had several doping cases in the last decades – came the year after her participation in the 2016 Rio Olympics. Besides failing the dope test in Jinhua and Bhubaneswar, she also tested positive in the 2017 Federation Cup and Inter-state championships. She had won both the titles.
Although her first positive test came out in July, 2017, the verdict was announced just over a week ago due to the long process involved. Manpreet had been the top Indian thrower since 2015, although her performance graph had not been steady. During the 2015 Kolkata Open National Athletic Championships, her winning throw was 17.96m, a national record, but she failed to repeat her performance at the Rio Olympics, managing only 17.06m that placed her overall 23rd.
Manpreet’s 17.96m mark set in Kolkata though will remain the national record.