World Championships finalist and medal prospect in the forthcoming Commonwealth Games, Davinder Singh Kang, has been tested positive for Androstane, an anabolic steroid by the Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU), the new anti-doping body of International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF). He now faces the prospect of being banned for four years that can eventually put an end to his career.
Kang’s dope failure was intimated to the Athletics Federation of India by the IAAF when he was preparing for the men’s javelin throw final in the first leg of the Indian Grand Prix at Patiala. Just an hour before the scheduled start of the competition, he was informed about his failed dope test. He was immediately suspended provisionally and his name withdrawn from the starting line-up of men’s javelin throw at the Indian Grand Prix.
The AIU officials tested Kang at a time prescribed by him under the ‘whereabouts’ clause of the Wada Code as he is one of the five Indian athletes placed in the IAAF Registered Testing Pool. “The athlete gave the timing window of 10 am to 11 am on that particular day (four days back) in his ‘whereabouts’ information. The AIU people came to Patiala and took his sample and that contained a banned steroid,” an official of AIU informed.
Hearing the news, Davinder looked confused. According to him, a urine sample collected on November 10, 2017 tested positive but the second sample collected on November 24 returned negative. “I have been told that it takes over three months for a substance like Androstane to get washed out. Then how is it that two samples taken within a fortnight have different results?” Kang asked.
It is to be noted that Kang had tested positive for marijuana last year but was not suspended by the NADA at the time, since marijuana falls under the ‘specified substance’ category in the World Anti-Doping Agency’s prohibited list of the performance-enhancing drugs.
