Four Indian athletes handed provisional suspension, two banned for doping offences
New Delhi (PTI): Goa National Games silver medal-winning steeplechaser Mohammed Nur Hasan, 2019 Asian Championships bronze medallist Murli Kumar Gavit, and India's World Cross Country Championships participants Hemraj Gurjar and Anjali Kumari have been put under provisional suspension after they tested positive for banned substances.
Distance runner G Lakshmanan and sprinter Himani Chandel have also been handed two and four-year bans respectively by the National Anti-Doping Agency panels in fresh doping cases in Indian athletics.
Hasan had won a 3000m steeplechase gold each in the Federation Cup and National Open Championships last year.
Gurjar had won the National Cross Country Championships in Gaya in January but finished 88th at the World Cross Country in Belgrade in March.
Anjali Kumari had finished second in the National Cross Country Championships in January and was chosen for the Worlds where she finished 80th.
Gavit, who won a bronze in 2019 Asian Championships in Doha, was the gold winner in a strange 5000m race at the National Open Championships last year where no athlete seemed keen to win the race.
All four of them figured in the latest list of athletes handed provisional suspension by the National Anti Doping Agency (NADA). It is not known where and when the samples were collected.
Meanwhile, it also emerged that Lakshmanan, who won a gold each in 5000m and 10,000m in the 2017 Asian Championships, has been handed two-year ban from August 10 last year onwards. His name figured among those who were handed sanctions by either the Anti-Doping Disciplinary Panel or the Anti-Doping Appeal Panel of the NADA.
Top sprinter Himani Chandel has also been banned for four years effective from June 15 last year.
Let the Truth be known. If you read VB and like VB, please be a VB Supporter and Help us deliver the Truth to one and all.
WB: 2 CISF personnel deputed for BJP leader Dilip Ghosh's security injured in attack
New Delhi/Kolkata, May 13: Two security personnel of the CISF deployed to protect West Bengal BJP leader Dilip Ghosh, were injured in an attack and stone-pelting incident at Bardhaman during the fourth phase of the Lok Sabha polls on Monday, official sources said.
"An incident of stone-pelting on CISF SSG protectee and attack on his vehicle by some miscreants occurred at Bardhaman (WB) in which two CISF personnel sustained head injuries. The protectee was safely evacuated without use of force," the central paramilitary force said in a post on social media platform 'X'.
Official sources confirmed the "protectee" mentioned in the post was West Bengal BJP leader Dilip Ghosh, who is contesting from the Bardhaman-Durgapur seat. Ghosh (59) is a 'Y' category protectee of the Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) VIP security wing called the Special Security Group (SSG).
The Bardhaman-Durgapur constituency went to polls in the fourth phase of the Lok Sabha elections on Monday.
"Police are just mute spectators. The TMC has let loose a reign of terror. Since morning, TMC goons have beaten up our polling agents and are not allowing the elections to be free and fair," Ghosh told reporters.
Clashes broke out between supporters of the TMC and the BJP in Monteswar's Susunia area of the Bardhaman-Durgapur Lok Sabha seat in the afternoon, when Ghosh was on his way to a polling booth following complaints of booth jamming.
As Ghosh was on his way, TMC supporters allegedly blocked his convoy and squatted in front of his vehicle, sources said, adding that stones were hurled at his convoy, due to which some of the cars of the security personnel tailing his convoy were damaged.
Ghosh was also heckled by TMC activists, they further said.
Ghosh's convoy was again attacked at the Kalna gate in the constituency, where Ghosh had gone to a booth following allegations of the TMC not allowing BJP's booth agents, the BJP leader said.
The TMC, however, denied the charges and alleged Ghosh was "trying to vitiate the atmosphere sensing defeat."
