NADA gets permission to conduct dope tests on Indian cricketers
India's Ministry of Sports has given its go ahead to the National Anti Doping Agency (NADA) to conduct dope tests on Indian cricketers and adopt the rules of World Anti Doping Agency (WADA). The ministry has also asked co-operation from the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), cricket's leading governing body in the country. Let us know more!
WADA had earlier sent a letter to the Sports Ministry, raising concerns over BCCI's non-compliance of the anti-doping programme. In 2016 as well, WADA had expressed its unhappiness after BCCI hired a foreign agency to conduct dope tests.
According to the order given by the Sports Ministry, NADA has full authority to send its team to BCCI recognized domestic and international matches in India and collect in-competition blood and urine samples of the cricketers. Rahul Bhatnagar, Secretary of Sports said that the out-of-the competition tests and sample collections will be done at a later stage.
Rahul Bhatnagar added that action will be taken if BCCI creates hurdles for NADA. He said, "I have instructed NADA's director general (Navin Agarwal) to send his DCOs to cricket tournaments in India to collect the samples of cricketers. If the BCCI resists or creates any hurdle in NADA's functioning, we won't hesitate from taking further action against the cricket board."
BCCI has hired International Doping Tests and Management (IDTM) to conduct dope tests on Indian cricketers. The tests are done at the National Dope Testing Laboratory, which is approved and accredited by the WADA. Furthermore, BCCI says that since it is a public body and does not take any grant from the government, it is not mandatory to have dope tests conducted from NADA.
According to the 2016 WADA reports, BCCI is not the only cricket governing body in the world which goes past the national anti-doping body. Cricket boards of Pakistan, West Indies and Bangladesh are other boards which directly report to ICC and the WADA.
