‘Failed sex test’ deposes India’s track queen

AN ASIAN Games silver medallist has failed a sex test and will be stripped of her medal.

Santhi Soundarajan of India won the silver medal in the women’s 800m on December 9 and undertook the gender verification test, which is not mandatory but carried out if officials want it or a rival protests.

“Santhi was subjected to a gender test in Doha and we have received the report which says she failed the test,” said Manmohan Singh, chairman of the Indian Olympic Association’s Medical Commission.

She was withdrawn from the 1,500m and sent home once the initial report was handed over to Indian Games officials, an Athletics Federation of India (AFI) source said yesterday.

“The Olympic Council of Asia (OCA) has been informed. The medal will be taken away from her.”

Maryam Jussuf Jamal of Bahrain won the 800m title in Doha where Soundarajan took the silver ahead of Viktoriya Yalovtseva of Kazakhstan. Zamira Amirova of Uzbekistan was fourth.

The OCA has yet to officially announce Soundarajan’s failed test.

Media reports said the OCA medical panel apparently took up the case on a “protest”, but it was not immediately clear which team had protested about Soundarajan’s gender.

The panel to decide gender cases comprises, among others, a gynaecologist, an endocrinologist, a psychologist and a genetic expert. A range of tests, including a blood test, are carried out.

Athletes who fail gender tests can seek a review by an expert panel after two years following “surgery and hormone therapy.”

If cleared, the athletes are eligible to compete again.

The 25-year-old Soundarajan, whose parents are brick-kiln workers, hails from the village of Kathakkurichi in Pudukkottai district of the southern state of Tamil Nadu. Yesterday, Tamil Nadu state chief minister Kalaignar M Karunanidhi brushed aside the controversy and presented a cheque of 1.5 million rupees (€25,650) to Soundarajan for her performance.

“I do not want to talk about it,” Soundarajan replied when questioned about the failed test.

Soundarajan had cleared the gender test at the Asian track and field championships in the South Korean city of Incheon last year where she won the silver in the 800m.

She also won the gold medal in the 1,500m at the South Asian Games in Colombo in August and was declared the best athlete at the Indian national championships in New Delhi in September. Soundarajan had been refused employment in the Indian railways last year because its medical panel “was not satisfied about her gender”.

This is the second controversy to hit the Indian track and field team within a month. Female shot putter Seema Antil was withdrawn from the Asian Games after she failed a pre-competition dope test.