Delhi, 13 November (H.S.): Indian athlete Kartik Kumar has been banned for three years over a doping violation. He accepted the sanction after testing positive for multiple prohibited anabolic agents, the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) announced on Thursday.

According to USADA, the agency acted on a tip and collected an out-of-competition urine sample from Kartik Kumar on February 27 while he was training in the United States. The sample was found to contain metabolites of several banned substances, including Metandienone and Stanozolol.

These included:

17α-methyl-5β-androstane-3α,17β-diol17β-methyl-5β-androst-1-ene-3α,17α-diol (epimetendiol)17β-hydroxymethyl-17α-methyl-18-norandrosta-1,4,13-trien-3-one (LTM)4-chloro-3α-hydroxyandrost-4-en-17-one (a clostebol metabolite)USADA collected another sample on March 19, which also tested positive for Metandienone metabolites.

However, under the rules, both samples were considered a single violation because Kartik had not been notified of the first positive result before the second sample was collected.The standard sanction for a doping offense is a four-year ban. However, the penalty can be reduced by one year if the athlete admits to the violation within 20 days of being notified.

Kartik Kumar availed this provision, leading to a three-year ban.His period of ineligibility began on April 10. Consequently, all his results, medals, points, and awards since February 27 have been disqualified.

Hindusthan Samachar / Jun Sarkar