Doping Menace in Indian Sport

As per the recent report of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), India has emerged as the highest contributor to doping violations for the third consecutive year, raising institutional credibility concerns amid ambitions to host the 2030 Commonwealth Games and the 2036 Olympic Games.

• The Lausanne Pitch & IOC Mandate: Recently, an Indian delegation led by PT Usha (IOA President) and Harsh Sanghavi (Gujarat Sports Minister) presented India’s bid for the 2036 Olympics in Lausanne, Switzerland. 
• The International Olympic Committee (IOC) explicitly flagged doping as a critical governance risk, warning that India must “get its house in order” to be considered a viable host.

Key Findings of the Recent WADA Report

• Global Infamy: India (260 cases) recorded the highest number of violations worldwide, nearly triple that of France (91) and Italy (85).
• The China Contrast: While India reported 260 cases from 7,113 tests (3.6% positivity), China conducted over 24,000 tests with only 43 positives (0.2% rate). 
  • This data invalidates the “more testing equals more cases” defense, highlighting that India’s crisis is a systemic failure rather than a volume-based statistical anomaly.
• Positivity Concentration: India’s 3.6% positivity rate was the highest among all nations that conducted more than 5,000 tests, highlighting a deep-rooted reliance on performance-enhancers.
• Sport-Specific Peaks: Athletics (76 cases), Weightlifting (43), and Wrestling (29) emerged as the primary “hotspots,” accounting for over 50% of total national violations.
• Lab Performance: The National Dope Testing Laboratory (NDTL) in New Delhi reported the highest positivity rate among all WADA-accredited labs globally (3.65%), contrasting sharply with labs in Cologne or Paris (below 0.7%).

Implications of These Findings for India

• Reputational Risk for 2036 Bid: The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has repeatedly flagged doping as a “governance risk.” 
  • Rivals like Qatar or Indonesia could leverage these figures to challenge India’s readiness to host the Olympic Games.
• Psychological Impact & Mental Health: The “win-at-all-costs” culture creates immense psychological strain, leading to performance anxiety and identity crises among young athletes who feel forced to choose between ethics and survival.
• Economic Deterrence: Corporate sponsors increasingly view Indian sports as a “high-risk” investment, potentially choking the private funding essential for the Target Olympic Podium Scheme (TOPS).

About Doping

• Definition: Doping refers to the illicit use of prohibited substances or methods—such as Anabolic Steroids, Erythropoietin (EPO), or Gene Doping—to gain an unfair physiological advantage. 
• Strict Liability Principle: Doping is governed by the Strict Liability Principle, which dictates that an athlete is solely responsible for any banned substance found in their sample, regardless of intent. 
• Methods of Doping: Beyond chemicals, it encompasses methods like Blood Manipulation and the use of Masking Agents to evade detection.

Common Types of Doping

Athletes typically use different substances depending on the specific demands of their sport (e.g., strength vs. endurance).

• Emerging Substance Threats: The 2025 landscape is dominated by Selective Androgen Receptor Modulators (SARMs)—often marketed in gyms as “safe supplements”—and Peptide Hormones, which have extremely short detection windows, challenging the technical limits of the NDTL.

The Most Common Performance Enhancers

• Muscle Growth and Strength: Anabolic Steroids are the most frequently used substances in sports, used primarily to build muscle mass and increase raw strength. 
  • These synthetic versions of testosterone allow athletes to train harder and recover much faster from intense workouts than they could naturally.
• Energy and Endurance Boosters: Stimulants and Erythropoietin (EPO) make up the other major category, used to increase alertness and stamina. 
  • While stimulants provide a quick burst of focus, EPO thickens the blood with extra red blood cells, allowing endurance athletes to perform at peak levels for much longer.
• Weight Control and Concealment: Masking Agents, such as diuretics, are widely used to hide the presence of other drugs or to meet weight classes. 
  • These substances help athletes flush their systems or dilute their urine, making it more difficult for officials to detect banned substances during a drug test.

Reasons behind India’s High Doping Numbers

• Socio-Economic Pressures: In India, sports are often seen as a key path to social mobility and financial security.
  • Desperation for Government Jobs: Many athletes from low-income backgrounds turn to doping to meet the strict performance standards required for Sports Quota jobs in government sectors like the Railways, Police, and Armed Forces, which provide job security and a stable income.
  • Cash Prizes and Incentives: Both state and central governments offer huge cash rewards for winning international medals (such as Olympic or Asian Games medals). This creates a high-pressure environment where the financial rewards of winning are much higher than the risks of being caught for doping.
• The “Entourage” Effect and Systemic Complicity: Athletes rarely engage in doping alone; they are often part of a larger, organized system.
  • Role of Coaches and Support Staff: Many grassroots coaches, who may not have formal training in sports science, encourage the use of performance-boosting substances.
  • Cultural Normalization: In high-risk sports like athletics, weightlifting, and wrestling, the use of supplements has become so common that young athletes don’t see it as a violation, either legally or morally.
• Awareness and Education Gaps: Even though NADA (National Anti-Doping Agency) has increased its outreach, awareness about doping remains low at the grassroots level.
  • Language Barriers: Most anti-doping education is in English or Hindi, which leaves athletes in rural or regional areas (like Haryana, Punjab, or Kerala) dependent on potentially misinformed intermediaries.
  • Misunderstanding of “Strict Liability”: Many athletes don’t understand the substance given by a coach or doctor. A 2024 survey showed that more than 25% of athletes took supplements without checking if they were doped.
• Unregulated Supplement Industry: One common defense in doping cases is “accidental doping” through contaminated supplements.
  • Spiked Products: The Indian nutraceutical market is poorly regulated, with many herbal or natural supplements being spiked with banned substances like Anabolic Steroids or stimulants such as Oxilofrine to give quick performance boosts.
• Institutional and Technical Challenges: India’s anti-doping system faces several institutional and technical challenges.
  • Reactive vs. Proactive Testing: While NADA has increased testing (over 7,100 tests in 2024), the focus has historically been on In-Competition testing. Dopers often take drugs during Out-of-Competition periods, allowing the drugs to clear the system before official testing takes place.
  • Resource Constraints: India has only one WADA-accredited lab (the National Dope Testing Laboratory), which causes delays in testing. This time lag means athletes may compete, win medals, and only be flagged for doping after the results are processed, reducing the effectiveness of the tests.

India’s Initiatives Related to Anti-Doping

• National Anti-Doping (Amendment) Act, 2025: This landmark legislation was recently operationalized to ensure NADA India has full operational independence from the government, fulfilling a critical WADA mandate for institutional autonomy.
• Digitalization via NIDAMS: The National Anti-Doping Data Administration and Management System has digitalized the entire testing lifecycle, from mission orders to results management, reducing human interference and error.
• NADA-FSSAI-NFSU Collaboration: A tripartite agreement between NADA, the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India, and the National Forensic Science University has established the nation’s first Center of Excellence for Nutritional Supplement Testing to certify “dope-free” products.
• Educational Reach: In 2025, NADA expanded its outreach to 329 awareness programs, utilizing the “Know Your Medicine” (KYM) App to help over 2.4 lakh stakeholders verify medications.
• NIDAMS Portal & Algorithmic Testing: The National Anti-Doping Data Administration and Management System (NIDAMS), launched in 2025, digitalizes the entire testing lifecycle. Its Mission Order Generation feature uses algorithms to select athletes for testing, eliminating human bias and preventing “tip-offs” or corruption.
• Dried Blood Spot (DBS) Testing: NADA has integrated DBS testing, a low-cost and minimally invasive method, to increase testing frequency in high-risk rural “hotspots” where traditional blood collection is logistically difficult.

Global Initiatives & Actions

• WADA Code Compliance: India aligns with the World Anti-Doping Code, which harmonizes testing and sanctioning standards across all National Anti-Doping Organizations (NADOs) globally.
• Athlete Biological Passport (ABP): A global standard used to monitor an athlete’s biological variables over time, allowing for the detection of “indirect” doping signals even when direct drug traces are absent.
• International Partnerships: India participates in regional workshops and UNESCO conventions to share intelligence and best practices on tackling designer drugs and organized trafficking.

Concerns and Challenges in India’s Anti-Doping Regime

• Behavioural and Ethical Crisis: 
  • The “Entourage” Exploitation: Beyond the athlete, a predatory sporting ecosystem of coaches, medical staff, and pharmacists often prioritises podium finishes over long-term health, exploiting grassroots athletes who lack the agency to resist.
  • A Culture of Evasion: Incidents of athletes fleeing testing at events such as the Khelo India University Games reflect a deep integrity deficit, where anti-doping norms are viewed as obstacles to be bypassed rather than ethical standards to be upheld.
  • From Individual to Institutional Liability: Under the National Sports Governance Act, 2025, responsibility has shifted to National Sports Federations (NSFs), which face loss of recognition and government funding for failing to implement NADA-approved education modules.
• Technical and Scientific Barriers: 
  • The Arms Race of Sophistication: The rapid proliferation of Selective Androgen Receptor Modulators (SARMs) and fast-clearing “designer” peptides has created a persistent technology lag, turning detection into a constant race for laboratories.
  • Capacity–Population Paradox: Dependence on a single World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA)-accredited National Dope Testing Laboratory (NDTL) is inadequate for a sporting population of 1.4 billion, causing logistical delays and limiting effective out-of-competition testing.
• Institutional and Legal Impediments: 
  • The Autonomy Paradox: Despite legislative intent, maintaining a genuine arm’s-length relationship between NADA and the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports remains difficult within a state-funded framework, affecting perceived neutrality.
  • Adjudicatory Gridlock: Chronic backlogs in the Anti-Doping Disciplinary Panel (ADDP) keep athletes under provisional suspension for extended periods, creating professional limbo and undermining the principle of timely justice.

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Way Forward

• Legislative Reform:
  • From Recipient to Architect Accountability: India must recalibrate its legal framework to target the architects of doping rather than focusing narrowly on athletes as end-users.
  • Criminalisation of Trafficking: Existing sports laws should be amended to impose strict criminal penalties on coaches, doctors, and pharmacists who facilitate or profit from performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs).
  • Protection of Minors: Introduce aggravated sentencing for administering PEDs to minors, treating such acts as “endangerment of youth” rather than mere sporting violations.
• Cultural Paradigm Shift:
  • Beyond Win-at-All-Costs: The prevailing medal-centric culture must give way to a values-based sporting ethos rooted in ethics and athlete welfare.
  • Mainstreaming Anti-Doping Literacy: Integrate anti-doping education into the National Sports Education Policy, beginning at the school and grassroots level.
  • The “Spirit of Sport” Metric: Evaluate National Sports Federations (NSFs) not only on medal tallies, but also on an Integrity Index measuring drug-free rosters, transparent education programmes, and compliance with National Anti-Doping Agency (NADA) norms.
• Technological Advancement:
  • From Volume to Precision: Shift from high-volume, low-impact testing to data-driven, intelligence-led surveillance.
  • Athlete Biological Passport (ABP) Saturation: Universalise the Athlete Biological Passport (ABP) across high-risk Olympic and non-Olympic disciplines to track long-term physiological markers, enabling detection of fast-clearing substances.
  • Indigenisation of Sports Science: Incentivise research and development into certified “Informed Sport” supplements, including scientifically validated Ayurvedic formulations, to provide safe, compliant recovery alternatives for Indian athletes.
• Institutional Accountability:
  • Independent Oversight: Mandate third-party audits of NADA’s Test Distribution Plan (TDP) to ensure testing is intelligence-led and risk-based rather than a predictable administrative exercise.
  • Decentralised Laboratory Infrastructure: Partner with premier technical and medical institutions (such as Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) and All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS)) to establish satellite sample collection and processing centres, reducing dependence on the National Dope Testing Laboratory (NDTL) and eliminating logistical backlogs.

Conclusion

India’s doping crisis is a systemic failure, not merely athlete misconduct. Restoring credibility requires supply-chain accountability, integrity-first sporting culture, intelligence-led detection, and institutional independence, aligning performance excellence with ethics, health, and global anti-doping norms.

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