AFI begins dope hearing despite NADA's request for a delay

Disregarding NADA's request to put on hold the disciplinary proceedings of dope tainted top quarter-milers Mandeep Kaur and Jauna Murmu, the Athletics Federation of India on Friday went ahead with the hearing with the athletes being represented by their lawyers.

The hearing at the AFI headquarters here was adjourned for July 20 as the National Dope Testing Laboratory could not provide on time the dope test related documents to the federation panel led by its Medical Committee chief Arun Mendiratta.

Mandeep and Jauna did not attend the hearing though AFI officials initially said that they would come. The AFI and NADA were in a tussle on who should conduct the disciplinary proceedings of the two athletes who had tested positive in the tests conducted by both IAAF and NADA as there is a case of jurisdictional overlapping.

"Mandeep and Jauna were today represented by their lawyers. The AFI panel collected the wakalatnama (power of attorney) from the lawyers of the athletes. The hearing has been adjourned for July 20 at 5:30 pm as the penal could not get the dope test related documents from the NDTL," AFI Director M L Dogra told reporters.

"The athletes wanted to examine the documents of their A and B sample tests and the chain of custody of these samples. But at 3:30pm we received a telephonic intimation from Shiela Jain, Principal Director of NDTL that due to some technical problems the documents will not be able to be provided to the AFI.

"We are hoping that we will get these documents by July 18 and these will be handed to the athletes," Dogra said.

The two athletes were represented by Delhi High Court lawyers, Rajat Bhardwaj and Sandeep Khatri. The three other members of the AFI panel were Dr Girish Tyagi, Dr Brijesh Kaushal and Capt (Dr) N R Tuli.