New Delhi: International Weightlifting Federation (IWF) has decided to waive off the suspension on the Indian Federation, serving a one-year ban for doping misconduct, in lieu of a fine allowing its athletes to get back into action at the upcoming Asian Games.
The IWF has informed the Indian Weightlifting Federation that their weightlifters would be free to take part in any international event once they pay the fine amounting to $50,000.
"The Indian Weightlifting Federation shall pay the fine of $50,000 and remain suspended from the membership of the IWF only until the whole amount of the fine is duly paid to the IWF," the IWF said in a letter to the Indian body.
The IWF also declared that the money procured would be utilised for the purpose of anti-doping activities.
"The IWF Executive Board declares that the fine shall be used for the purpose of anti-doping activities," it said in the letter.
The national Federation was suspended for 12 months till March next year after India's Edwin Raju and Tejinder Singh tested positive for a banned steroid at the Melbourne Commonwealth Games earlier this year.
Shailaja Pujari and B Prameelavalli were the other two who returned positive tests in the pre-event doping tests conducted by WADA officials at the national camp in Patiala.
Four positive cases in a calender year were more than enough for the IWF to ban the Indian Federation for a second time within seven months of coming out of a previous ban following the Athens Olympic doping fiasco.
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The decision apparently came after the IWF realised that several countries, including Iran, Kazakhstan, Russia and Argentina were at present serving their suspension period and would not be able to take part in the Doha Asian Games to be held in December.
Since the wrongdoing of few weightlifters was affecting the young and innocent lifters, most of these countries, who do not have problem with the funds, would be willing to pay and become active at the earliest.
As far as the Indian case is concerned, there was dim hope for their athletes due to lack of adequate financial resources.
"We are looking at it (paying fine) if we can arrange some funds. We have money but that won't be enough and pooling in money is not easy. We have not yet initiated any talks in this regard so far," national Federation President H J Dora said.
"We will try our best, otherwise it would be like killing the prospects of the beginners," he said.
Also, the lack of preparation of the Indians in the absence of any scheduled training camp would make picking the right candidates for the competition in a short span a difficult proposition.
"We did not plan a training camp and we will have to see who could be the candidates to be sent to such an important event, which is just a couple of months away," Indian Federation General Secretary Balbir Singh Bhatia said.
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