NEW DELHI: The National School Games, inter-university athletics championships and Board meets will henceforth be required to have mandatory dope testing.

The Annual General Meeting (AGM) of the Athletics Federation of India (AFI) on Friday ruled that if no dope tests were conducted in these meets, results in such meets would not be recognised by the federation.

The inter-university meet at Bangalore earlier this year had made a beginning in dope control with samples being tested in Delhi. Ten athletes are believed to have come positive, though, given the lack of rules and procedures at the university-level, the matter had been left to the Inter-University Sports Board to tackle at its April meeting.

Though the AFI has seemingly tightened dope control regulations, there is no sign yet there would be transparency in the matter. No figures of sanctioned cases have been revealed for 2005 and 2006, leave alone names of the athletes who have turned in "positives" during the past two seasons.

Penalty

The AGM also decided that the States sending over-aged athletes would be imposed a penalty of Rs.10,000 per athlete and in case more than three athletes were found to be above the age limit during a year, the State could face suspension.

Suspension threat also hangs over districts that do not field their athletes in State and National districts meets.

The meeting expressed its "satisfaction" over the performance of the athletes at the Doha Asiad, though a mention was made about the lesser number of medals won this time compared to the Busan Games.

Compared to seven golds in a total of 15 in 2002, athletes won only one gold in a tally of nine medals this time.

Appreciation

The meeting appreciated that the performances of all the athletes (in Doha) were better than the performances given by them at home in 2006 (this was actually based on an erroneous assessment since only six of the 22 athletes entered in individual events returned performances better than that achieved at home last season. Incidentally, all six, Sunil Kumar Singh (5000m), Surendra Kumar Singh (5000m, 10,000m) and M. Renjith (triple jump) and O.P. Jaisha (5000m), Preeja Sreedharan (5000m, 10,000m) and Krishna Poonia (discus) returned personal bests).

The AFI has also identified the events to prepare for the Beijing Olympics. They are 4x400m relay, discus and shot put for men and 4x400m relay, long jump, discus and heptathlon for women.

The prominent athletes, in training now at Potchefstroom, South Africa, will return in time for the domestic meets beginning in May.

The meeting made Mr. Suresh Kalmadi as the Life President of the AFI and formally approved the nomination of Mr. Umrao Singh as the acting President. Mr. Kalmadi had resigned as the president in 2005.

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