Jokes Apart | When anti-doping officials arrived to play, all runners ran away

They say it takes two to tango, but a runner has proven otherwise. Now, this was not your everyday jogger going on a solo jog. It was the final of the men’s 100m at the Delhi State Athletics Meet held in the last week of September. According to a report in a national broadsheet, “All the other finalists fled when National Anti-Doping Agency (NADA) officials arrived.” One man decided to brazen it out. Earlier this month, when the report came out, he tested positive for a banned anabolic steroid, Drostanolone metabolite, which sounds like the name of an Unidentified Flying Object. One has heard about the loneliness of the long-distance runner. This is the first time I’m hearing of the loneliness of the 100m runner, a blink-and-miss event — more like a controlled explosion — which is all about a short, intense burst of power. Before we get to the runners who bunked, thus avoiding the ignominy of the failed dope test, I’d like to put myself in the shoes of the lone participant. It takes courage to go it alone. It is said of talented people at the height of their powers that their biggest competition is with themselves. Our man proves the maxim. In his case, the competition was invisible, a floating mirage. It was snapping at his heels virtually, even as he surged faster and breasted the tape. I’m sure he bested his record. For some reason, it reminded me of elections in North Korea. It also reminded me of those who when asked about their love life say, “I am in a relationship with myself.” There are perfectly legit solo pursuits like fishing for trout, rowing a boat, flying a kite, painting a picture, surfing the internet, strumming the guitar, nursing a pint, plucking flowers, chasing butterflies, browsing artefacts in a museum, going for a long walk, swimming laps in the pool, or reading a book. Speaking of books, the closest a writer can come to doping in sports is plagiarism. In the post-AI world, this is not a problem, for AI is the biggest plagiariser of them all. It’s encoded in its DNA. The man who ran against himself must be a true loner. His hobbies are most likely to be of the self-sufficient variety: gardening, cooking, hacking a website, feeding pigeons, withdrawing cash from the ATM and singing in the shower. When he retires from active sport, there are plenty of careers he will be cut out for; he can become a serial killer, a lone wolf stabber with a knife, a night chowkidar with a danda, or a bedroom puppeteer. Eventually, when he has a heart attack, I can picture him dashing the hospital — on his own two feet. Not for him the uncritical conformity of the hive mind. His fellow participants, who did a runner when they heard that the anti-doping guys were coming, did what was conventionally logical. When the cops come, you flee. To develop cold feet was an instinct of self-preservation. When the boys came out to play, Georgie Porgie ran away. Our man was tempting fate like a bullfighter: Aa bail mujhe maar. This also gave him the moral high ground. After failing the test, he blamed it on contaminated protein supplements. It’s like saying I surrendered to the police who were chasing me to prove my innocence. The jury is out on this one. Jokes apart, dishonesty in Indian sport is an issue which needs to be addressed unflinchingly. We need a Swacch Sports Abhiyan. Rahul Dravid has been speaking about age fraud in cricket for close to a decade now. In a 2019 interview, he didn’t hold back, “Age fraud leads to an erosion of culture. It leads to a scenario where a lot of talented boys don’t get to play, when they should actually be playing. It is up to the maidan secretaries, the owners of the office teams, the club teams to ensure that this does not happen.” Delivering the MAK Pataudi lecture in 2015-16, he compared the “scourge of overage players” in junior cricket to match-fixing. What he said is worth quoting in its entirety. “If a child sees his parents and coaches cheating and creating a fake birth certificate, will he not be encouraged to become a cheat? He is being taught to lie by his own elders. That entire exercise begins when a coach alters a player’s date of birth so that he can take part in a local tournament. The parents are happy to accept the value of an extra year or two, particularly in junior cricket and, academically at middle school.” “The truth is that the player who has faked his age might make it at the junior level not necessarily because he is better or more talented, but because he is stronger and bigger. We all know how much of a difference a couple of years can make at that age. That incident will have another ripple effect: An honest player deprived of his place by an overage player, is disillusioned. We run the risk of losing him forever.” To its credit, the BCCI has taken measures to fix the problem. It has, to use a term often deployed by cricket professionals, shown “intent” by conducting bone density tests to eradicate the problem. It has also made it a rule that Under-19 players can play in only one World Cup. Coming back to athletics and the bravery of the lone short-distance runner, the governing body, the World Anti-doping Agency (WADA) has taken note. Meanwhile, talking to reporters, the President of the Athletics Federation of India, Adille Sumariwalla, said, “India’s reputation is at stake. If we don’t stop this, we will have an even bigger problem. We don’t want that to happen if we have to bid for the Olympic Games.” It is said of substance abusers that it is only they who can help themselves, and that happens when you reach rock bottom. However personal addiction is different from an entrenched malpractice like doping. What cannot be denied is that rock bottom has been reached. The case of the vanishing participants, leaving one man standing, who turns out to be a rotten apple himself, shows that doping is not the exception but the rule. The writing is on the wall. It’s time to pick up the pieces and make athletics whole again, especially at a time when Indian sport, generally speaking, has upped its profile and captured the nation’s imagination. The writer is the author of ‘The Butterfly Generation: A Personal Journey into the Passions and Follies of India’s Technicolour Youth’, and the editor of ‘House Spirit: Drinking in India’. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely that of the author. They do not necessarily reflect Firstpost’s views. Read all the Latest News , Trending News , Cricket News , Bollywood News , India News and Entertainment News here. Follow us on Facebook , Twitter and Instagram .