As many as five centrally contracted players from BCCI have been issued a notice by the National Anti-Doping Agency (NADA) for failure to report their whereabouts.
The names include prominent Indian cricketers such as KL Rahul, Ravindra Jadeja, Cheteshwar Pujara, Deepti Sharma and Smriti Mandhana. They are five out of 110 players listed in the National Registered Testing Pool (NRTP).
The apex cricketing body in India cited ‘password glitches’ as the reason for the delay. Meanwhile, NADA Director-General, Navin Agarwal has affirmed that BCCI responded with the justification for the five NRTP players’ failure to submit their whereabouts.
“There are two ways to fill up the whereabouts form in the ADAMS (Anti Doping Administration & Management Systems) software. Either athlete does it himself or association fills it upon his or her behalf,” Agarwal was quoted by PTI.
“Now athletes in some discipline aren’t educated enough or do not have access to the internet and find themselves unable to handle the whereabouts clause of the ADAMS or upload the filled up form. They use the assistance of their concerned federations. So federations have accepted the responsibility of uploading their whereabouts,” he added.
Agarwal’s statement implies that cricketers often find it challenging to complete the process by themselves.
“Similarly in cricket also, although these people are well qualified and they can do it, perhaps they don’t have the time for whatever reasons, so the federation concerned, the BCCI has taken upon itself the responsibility of uploading their whereabouts.”
NADA’s rule stipulates players to mention their whereabouts during the three-month period when the nation has been under lockdown.
However, three such failures to report the whereabouts leads to players facing two years suspension upon hearing and one Anti Doping Rule Violation (ADRV).
“BCCI’s explanation will be discussed as to whether it will be counted as one of three filing failures or not. It will be decided on the explanation given and how they (BCCI) proceed from here,”
Given the fact that the BCCI has put constraints on its players when it comes to media interactions, it remains difficult to find out why the password glitch took days to resolve.
