The Narsingh saga doesn’t come as a surprise to sports fans
The Indian hope for the podium in Olympics has always been like a riddle to all sports stake holders. In my column of 22nd May in this newspaper, I did mention “Our mission to Olympic is visionless”--which seems to be close to be true. In last few days the focus of the Olympics in India has been on the Narsingh Saga, the claims and counter claims have made the situation complex and more complicated.
I would like to walk the different path in this whole episode and evaluate the situation, with a different angle. Who is responsible for such situations and why do they happen?
The Olympics bound athletes testing positive just before the games is not new to all of us in India. Barring 2012, each Indian contingent had Black Sheep in the Olympics team , the unhealthy competition has become so deep rooted in our system that today we stand tall in this
3 position in the world.
Idoping medal tally at the No.
The most surprising part of the episode is that on 13th July, 2016 Director General of NADA, Mr. Naveen Agarwal stated that “All Rio bound athletes have been tested , some have been tested thrice, twice and some once” all 123 Athletes have cleared the test, but surprisingly we get the news of Narsingh Yadav and Indeerjeet Singh testing positive within few days of this statement, this certainly raises question about our seriousness towards Dope fiasco.
According to the World Anti-Doping Authority {WADA} which has a clear policy on the “whereabouts clause” of elite athletes all over the world in which every athlete is obliged to inform their whereabouts and make themselves available at a short notice for a Dope test. Why it is so difficult for our agency NADA to keep close watch on their athletes specially with just a fortnight before the Olympics!! f we dig deep into the Narsingh controversy we can put two and two together and maybe have the agency look into the Bulgarian angle where he gave his first test on 2nd June 2016 in which he was not found positive. Thereafter, he leaves for Bulgaria for a training and exposure trip , (but not for a competition) probably on the 6th of June and came back on the 22nd June 2016 and then goes for a second Dope test on the 25th June.
Thereafter he goes for the third dope test on 5th July 2016 -- surprisingly both came positive, the Narsingh Camp cried foul by saying “that on 5th June, Narsingh's food was spiked by an intruder and froth was found in his food". The moot point is was Narsingh even in Sonipat or had he left for Bulgaria after the first successful Dope test. I am not blaming or passing a judgment that he was involved in the act of drug consumption , but I am raising a pertinent question mark on our own system.
An elite athlete who should be a responsibility either of the respective association ;Indian Olympic association ; Sports Ministry or Sports Authority of India, but none of them seem to have taken over the athlete and his responsibility. It seems that the athletes and cattle in our country are not very different, they are left on their own for survival, with even a few days before the Olympics our athletes are not handled with due care regarding their well being.
The government goes out of the way to fund the athletes for four years in the hope to get more medals for the country, but slipped from their responsibility towards the end and the result is “The Narsingh Saga”.