Indian weightlifter Ravi Kumar Katulu banned for four years after failing drug test

New Delhi: India’s Commonwealth Games weightlifting gold medal winner Ravi Kumar Katulu has been banned for four years after failing a drug test, a top anti-doping official told AFP on Tuesday. The 31-year-old Kumar, who won the 69kg title at the 2010 Commonwealth Games and a silver in 2014 (77kg), tested positive for Ostarine, media reports said. [caption id=“attachment_7603991” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] File image of India’s Ravi Kumar Katulu. AFP[/caption] Ostarine helps increase muscle mass though is not available to the public. “Ravi Kumar has been suspended for four years,” National Anti-Doping Agency (NADA) director general Navin Agarwal told AFP without naming the substance involved. Ostarine is a “selective androgen receptor modulator”, or SARM, which doping experts say has been increasingly used as an alternative to steroids. No country has yet allowed its use as a medicine but it is widely available on the black market. The ban is a new blow for scandal-tainted Indian weightlifting, which has been restricted to only four Olympic places — two men and two women — in Tokyo next year because of its high number of doping cases.