New Delhi: India’s triple jumper Aishwarya Babu and sprinter MV Jilna have been banned by India’s National Anti-Doping Agency (NADA) and Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU), respectively, after both tested positive for the drugs prohibited by World Anti-doping Agency (WADA).
Aishwarya won a gold medal in the triple jump during the National Inter-State Championships in June last year, with a leap of 14.14 m establishing a new national record. Following this event, she was tested by NADA officers. As per Olympics.com, the NADA stated that Aishwarya’s samples returned positive for Ostarine, which falls under the WADA-prohibited category of selective androgen receptor modulator (SRAM). As a result, Aishwarya will lose her national record and it will revert back to the 14.11 m leap by Olympian Mayookha Johny in 2011.
The Indian athlete was provisionally suspended in July last year by NADA and has served around six months of her four-year ban. NADA also revealed that athlete had not taken a mandatory therapeutic use exemption from the agency before using the drug. In her reply, Aishwarya stated that she ‘did not take any prohibited substance in order to enhance’, but to rather took Ostarine on her colleague’s advice to get rid of shoulder pain ahead of inter-state championships. However, her response failed to convince NADA’s disciplinary panel.
‘It shall be noted that the athlete has failed to satisfy the panel that the ADRV (Anti-Doping Rule Violation) was unintentional…She is hereby sanctioned with an ineligibility of four years. The period of ineligibility shall commence from the date of provisional suspension (July 18, 2022)’, said NADA. ‘The athlete is hereby disqualified of all of the individual results obtained in the said event with all consequences, including forfeiture of all medals, points and prizes’, it added.
Aishwarya can appeal NADA’s verdict till March 6. On the other hand, MV Jilna, a regular feature in India’s domestic circuit, has been handed a ba of three years by the Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU), starting from June 22, 2022 and ending on July 21, 2025. Jilna tested positive for pralmorelin, a growth hormone prohibited by the World Athletics.
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