Doping: Akkunji, 6 others banned for 1 year

Seven top Indian athletes, including Asian Games double gold-medallist Ashwini Akkunji, were today handed bans for flunking dope tests earlier this year, virtually ending their chances of participating in the London Olympics next year.

The seven athletes include six quartermilers -- Mandeep Kaur, Sini Jose, Mary Tiana Thomas, Priyanka Pawar, Jauna Murmu and Akkunji -- and long jumper Harikrishanan Muraleedharan, who flunked dope tests for banned steroids.

The athletes were not present when the decision was announced at the National Anti-Doping Agency headquarters here.

While the six women athletes have been banned for a year, Muraleedharan has been slapped with a two-year ban.

All of them can appeal against the bans to NADA appellate panel but their lawyers said they would assess the judgement before taking a decision on that.

NADA panel head Dinesh Dayal announced a reduced penalty period as the athletes were not found guilty of intentionally taking the banned substances.

The maximum suspension stands at two years for first-time violators.

"We find all the seven athletes guilty of doping violations under clause 2.1 of Anti-doping Rule. The date of suspension begins from today and any period under provisional suspension shall be credited in their penalty period which is one year," he told reporters.

"We did not find any significant fault on the part of these athletes on how the banned substance entered their bodies, and they will get reduced penalty under clause 10.5.2 NADA rule. Two athletes -- Mary Tiana Thomas and Jauna Murmu -- were tested twice in May and June and they cannot be held guilty on two counts," he said.

In the submissions by NADA, it was found that foreign coach Yuri Ogorodnik was responsible for giving the banned substance to the athletes.

"In fact, the defense taken by the athletes is an admission of the facts that their coach had given them the nutritional supplement and that there were Prohibited Substances in the nutritional supplement, Ginseng Kinapi Pil being administered by the coach," the NADA order read.

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