News Reports from Delhi confirm that the Paralympic champion in badminton has violated the whereabouts clause and therefore has been suspended for 18 months from the sport. Unfortunately, Pramod Bhagat will miss the Paris Paralympics due to this suspension, effective immediately. This incident proves to be a major loss for India’s medal prospects.
What is the whereabouts clause?
The whereabouts clause is a critical element of the anti-doping regulations. It mandates athletes to provide detailed and continuous updates about their out-of-competition testing. Any dereliction can lead to immediate suspension as in the case of Bhagat.
Understanding Bhagat
Hailing from the district, Bihar, Bhagat is the world no. 2 in para-badminton men’s singles. He made India proud at the Tokyo 2020 Summer Paralympics in Men’s singles when he bagged a gold medal beating Daniel Bethell of Great Britain in the final.
Pramod Bhagat developed polio when he was just five years old resulting in a disability affecting his left leg for life. His tryst with badminton occurred at 13 when he was taken to watch a match. The next few years he threw himself into the game, working on his fitness, footwork, and other aspects of the game. Eventually, when he was 15 years old, he participated in a tournament against normal players and received tremendous encouragement from the audience. This event surged him into his badminton career and there was no looking back.
Pramod Bhagat’s achievements
In 2019 Pramod Bhagat attained the Arjuna Award and Biju Patnaik Sports Award in Odisha. In 2021, he achieved the highest sporting honour of India, the Khel Ratna Award. In 2022, he was the Padma Shri, the fourth-highest civilian award of the Republic of India.
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Updates on what happened
An official statement released said that “On March 1, 2024, the Court of Arbitration of Sport (CAS) Anti-Doping Division found Bhagat in breach of the BWF anti-doping regulations for committing three whereabouts failures within 12 months.”
In response, Bhagat has submitted an appeal to the CAS Appeals Division. However, the CAS Appeals Division dismissed Bhagat’s appeal on 29 July 2024 and confirmed the CAS Anti-Doping Division of 1 March 2024.
Other Paralympians banned over the years for various reasons
In 2016, swimmer Jessica Long and wheelchair racer Tanni Grey-Thompson in 2017 were banned for misrepresenting their classifications. At the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games, Vinod Kumar, a discus thrower was found to have intentionally misrepresented his abilities and was banned for two years.
In 2023, the IPC began analysing their athlete classification code as there posed a risk to the Games’ credibility.
In the 1992 Barcelona Games, five athletes used banned substances, and in 2000 fourteen athletes tested positive at the Sydney Games in a powerlifting competition.
Unfortunately, the Paralympics has also been tainted with steroid use. Three powerlifters and German basketball players were banned after being tested positive at the 2008 Games in Bejing.
At the 2002 Winter Paralympics German Skier Thomas Oelsner won two gold medals that were eventually stripped off after he tested positive for a drug test. He became the first Winter Paralympian to test positive for steroids.
In the 2010 Winter Paralympics in Vancouver, Swedish curler Glenn Ikoen was suspended for six months by the IPC. In his defense, the Paralympian said that his doctor had prescribed a medication that was on the banned substances list.
In 2000 for the first time in the sport, the Sydney 2000 Doping Control Program introduced out-of-competition testing to ensure that the games met the International Paralympic Medical and Anti-Doping Code.
Other forms of doping emerged
The IPC discovered other forms of doping that they had to worry about like ‘boosting’ and gene therapy. In ‘Boosting’ athletes with a spinal cord injury induces autonomic dysreflexia and increases blood pressure. In 1994 the IPC banned this practice, but it is still an ongoing problem.
In gene therapy, athletes are known to undergo gene doping to enhance their abilities. It is however difficult to identify these approaches. Presently the World Anti-Doping Agency is researching both gene doping and gene therapy. This will help ascertain the boundaries between the two closely related doping mechanisms.
About the Author
Sherral is a co-author of an anthology of poems. She is also an avid blogger and has written more than 100 blogs on various topics. She has won a UNESCO award for her work on literary learning spaces. She began her writing career 5 years ago when she released stories of ‘Ordinary women leading extraordinary lives’ on the digital medium. She completed her post-graduation from the Singapore Institute of Management and recently decided to reinvent her career by transforming her love for writing into a profession.
