Not SAI's duty to treat Dutee so shabbily
This is not the first time a female athlete from India has been embarrassed and made to feel like a dope cheat. Call it exuberance or sheer callousness, the way the SAI and the Athletics Federation of India has dealt with Dutee is awful.
The Sports Authority of India has shown complete insensitivity in dealing with the plight of young and promising athlete Dutee Chand.
Days before the Indian track and field team was to leave for Glasgow to compete in the Commonwealth Games, news broke that the Orissa girl was ineligible to compete because of an increased androgen level in her body. In the normal course, androgen (primarily testosterone) levels are usually associated with a male athlete. However, in case there is suspicion that a female athlete exhibits certain male characteristics and it gives her an extra edge over the field, there is cause for checking for hyperandrogenism.
This is not the first time a female athlete from India has been embarrassed and made to feel like a dope cheat. Call it exuberance or sheer callousness, the way the SAI and the Athletics Federation of India has dealt with Dutee is awful.
Sources in SAI say a test was called for by the AFI on the reigning 100 and 200 metres sprint champion as it felt something was amiss. Whether it was due to certain changed physical characteristics or something else is best known to the AFI.
Then again, this is not the first time a female athlete at home has faced such trauma. To be sure, every other person knows the names of Shanti Soundarrajan, silver medalist at the 2006 Doha Asian Games, who failed a gender test.
The name of Pinki Pramanik is even more famous, as the 2002 Busan Asian Games gold medalist flunked a gender test and was later accused of rape in Kolkata. If you talk to old timers who were part of India's campaigns as long back as the 1978 Asian Games in Bangkok, a track and field athlete failed a gender test. Yet, the officials showed great care in keeping her name under wraps.
Not many would know that the athlete in question was so traumatised, her teammates and coaches felt she could even have committed suicide at that point of time. Nobody went to the media and shouted out her name. Her anonymity is something which needs to be respected and she continues to work even today with the Indian Railways. Then again, in 1990, at the Beijing Asian Games, a woman hockey player failed a gender test and had to be sent home. In an age when TV channels were not around to rip open privacy and the internet did not exist, the player returned home safe and sound.
Coming back to Dutee, it was not SAI's duty to issue a press release and vilify her (without mentioning her name). Today, it is well known that the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the international athletics body (IAAF) have stopped conducting gender tests as it has become so sensitive.
Tests for hyperandrogenism are well prescribed and even in India the government has laid down the SOP (standard operative procedure) in black and white. If at all the SAI and AFI cared for Dutee, they would not have meted out such treatment to her. WHEN it comes to an athlete failing a dope test, what the SAI does is to inform the concerned federation and athlete. Once the 'A' sample comes positive, a test is ordered on the second sample called 'B'. Mind you, nobody is in a hurry to tell the world a dope cheat has been caught.
Benefit of doubt has to be given to athletes, as was the case in 2010 at home when so many athletes tested positive for MHA (methylhexanamine). The athletes said they were innocent and health supplements could be the cause. This time, Dutee has been painted like a cheat by the SAI, unmindful of the fact that she did not use anything to boost her hormone levels for achieving any advantage.
In an age where the media feasts on sensational news, Dutee has become a victim for no fault of hers. As if to rub salt into the wounds, we have thick-skinned officials who tell us she could again compete as a female athlete if her androgen levels are below the prescribed limits of 2 nanograms per millilitre. For those unaware of the jargon, a nanogram is one-billionth of a gram!
Logic demanded that the SAI and the AFI spoke to Dutee and her family in Orissa and pointed out that something was wrong. After that, she could have been pulled out of the squad. At least, that way, the young girl would not have been subjected to this kind of public humiliation where the average person now wonders if she is a boy or a girl.
Today, when rape cases are mentioned, the name of the victim is not supposed to be given away. Take the case of the December 16, 2012 gang-rape victim in New Delhi. By and large, people have shown care in respecting her personal identity. The SAI, best known as a body which maintains stadia in India, cannot be allowed to get away with something which borders on character assassination. Athletes crave for respect, more so when they are down and out. Ideally, I would not have named the athlete, but it's now out in full glare in public domain.
s.kannan@mailtoday.in