Long jumper Anju Bobby George is hoping to become the first Indian track and field athlete to bag an Olympic medal almost 14 years after the Athens Olympics in which she finished sixth, the Indian Express reported.
Anju, who was upgraded to gold winning status in the 2005 World Athletics Final after Russia’s Tatyana Kotova was stripped of her medal in 2013 following a retesting of her 2005 samples, along with two longer jumpers from United Kingdom and Australia have asked for an investigation into possible doping violations at the 2004 Athens Olympics and have found support from their respective federations.
The report said, the athletics federations of India, UK and Australia last month sent a letter to the CEO of the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF), Olivier Gers, calling for an investigation into the event. They also want the IAAF to petition the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to annul the results of the 2004 Summer Games as the three medal winners from Russia — Tatyana Lebedeva, Irina Simagina and Tatyana Kotova — have since been charged with doping.
Marion Jones, who came fourth in Athens, has already been stripped off her position for an alleged doping offence, thereby pushing Anju to fifth spot behind Australia’s Bronwyn Thompson.
This means that if the IAAF and IOC accept their claim, then Anju could be upgraded to an Olympic silver.
The federations have cited the report by World Anti-Doping Agency’s investigator Richard McLaren, which exposed the institutionalised doping by Russian athletes for years and resulted in them being banned from the 2016 Rio Games and this year’s Winter Olympics.
“We have the backing of three athletics federations. Now everyone knows that the Russians have been indulging in state-sponsored doping for years. This is like the BALCO case where a lab (based in California) was supplying previously undetectable drugs to athletes,” Anju was quoted as saying by the paper.
“I can confirm that three federations, including India, have written a letter to the IAAF CEO requesting the Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU) to investigate the matter,” said her lawyer Vidushpat Singhania told the paper.
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