Continuing to back dope-tainted wrestler Narsingh Yadav, a top Wrestling Federation of India official on Friday claimed the 74-kg freestyle wrestler would have clinched the silver medal had he taken part in the Rio Olympics instead of being banned for four years by the CAS. "Narsingh would have won at least a silver medal, I can assure you that," said WFI secretary VN Prasood here on the sidelines of a press conference to announce a world level prize money event.
Narsingh was exonerated on doping charges at home by NADA which upheld his claim that his food/drink during his stay while training for the Games at Sonepat in Haryana had been spiked with banned substance, which he had injected. WADA challenged the clean chit given to Narsingh by its Indian affiliate at the Court of Arbitration for Sports in Rio a day before he was set to take part in his weight class bouts. CAS threw him out of the Games and also slapped a four-year ban on the Indian grappler after he failed to produce any "real evidence" regarding the sabotage theory he had presented.
Prasood said, "On August 18 Narsingh gave a medical at noon and had his weight-in at 1.30 pm. His name was even there in the fixtures. At 8.30 pm in the night CAS released their judgement. CAS told him give your weight, don't worry about anything in the afternoon, we'll give a result at night. So why should we have been thinking about it (ban)," asked Prasood when reporters questioned him on the matter. "That's when we actually thought that after 21st they will take any action, (that) if they want to punish they will take away medal if Narsingh had won any medal. The judgment was unexpected. If only they had given this verdict earlier, we could have sent Praveen Rana," he said.
"How many days does WADA have to appealIJ On August 2 we had a result from NADA, inside 24 hours WADA received the result. Narsingh left the country for Rio on 10th. WADA didn't do a thing against Narsingh until the 13th. They filed an appeal on 13th, federation didn't get any information till the 16th," he elaborated.