Former Asian Games Gold-Winning Discus Thrower Seema Punia Banned For 16 Months In Doping Case

New Delhi: Former Asian Games gold-winning discus thrower Seema Punia has been handed a 16-month ban for failing a dope test.

The 42-year-old Punia's suspension came into force on November 10 -- the date of the decision by the Anti-Doping Disciplinary Panel (ADDP) -- as per the updated list of dope offenders by the National Anti-Doping Agency (NADA).

NADA, however, did not specify the substance for which she has tested positive.

The latest offence adds to her checkered doping record, which includes two previous violations, one of them at the junior level when she was merely 17.

Her last competition was the Hangzhou Asian Games in October 2023 where she won a bronze medal. She is also a four-time Commonwealth Games-medallist, three of them being silver medals.

She has not competed since the Hangzhou Asian Games. She did express a desire to retire after the 2024 Paris Olympics for which she could not qualify. Punia had competed in four Olympics (2004, 2012, 2016 and 2020) and five Commonwealth Games.

A contemporary of 2010 Commonwealth Games gold medallist Krishna Poonia, her career has spanned for more than two decades. He personal best is 64.84m, which she came up way back in 2004.

She won a medal in each of the first four CWGs but failed to stand on the podium in the 2022 Birmingham edition.

Her first and only Asian Games gold came in 2014, Incheon edition. She also won a bronze in the 2018 Asian Games. At the junior level, she won a bronze in the world championships in 2002.

She worked as coach of para javelin thrower Sandeep Chaudhary when he won a silver in the World Para Athletics Championships in New Delhi earlier this year.

Apart from Punia, distance runner Pooja Yadav (four years), shot putter Manjeet Kumar (six years) and middle-distance runner Nikesh Dhanraj Rathod (four years) were also suspended for failing dope tests.

Also suspended for four years were marathon runner Kuldeep Singh and woman steeplechaser Chhavi Yadav for separate doping violations.

(Except for the headline, this article has not been edited by FPJ's editorial team and is auto-generated from an agency feed.)