Unwanted No. 1: India again tops the global list of doping violations in athletics

India continues to top the global list of athletes and support personnel serving bans for doping and related offences, according to the latest list released by the Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU), news agency PTI reported.The AIU list has 162 names from India, the most of any country. Kenya is in second place with 148 names, Russia is third with more than 60 cases.The list includes people who are serving time for doping offences. It also includes those found guilty of non-doping rule violations such as manipulation, test avoidance, human trafficking or failure to provide whereabouts information, as these offenses are punishable in the same way as doping violations.The Athletics Integrity Unit is an independent anti-doping body established by World Athletics. Supervises international level athletes and their support staff.India moved ahead of Kenya for the first time in April this year and remained at the top when the June list was released.Earlier in April, World Athletics classified India as an “extremely high” risk of doping after topping the list of doping offenders in athletics for the previous two years.Following a recent decision by the AIU Council, the Athletics Federation of India (AFI) has been moved from Category B to Category A under Rule 15 of the World Anti-Doping Rules for Athletics.“Unfortunately, the quality of the domestic anti-doping program is simply not commensurate with the doping risk,” AIU President David Howman said in a statement.India was among the two countries with the highest number of anti-doping rule violations (ADRVs) in athletics between 2022 and 2025.According to AIU, India recorded 48 ADRVs in 2022 (ranked second), 63 in 2023 (ranked second), 71 (ranked first) in 2024 and 30 ADRVs (ranked first) in 2025.According to the World Athletics Anti-Doping Rules, the AIU Council divides member federations into different risk categories based on their doping records. Category A represents the highest risk, category B represents medium risk and category C represents low risk.Member federations in category A must meet stricter anti-doping requirements. These include maintaining and implementing an annual testing program that complies with the international standard for testing and investigation.The testing program must ensure that athletes selected for a national team at any World Series of Athletics, Olympic Games or World Athletics Championships event who are not already included in the international testing registration pool are adequately tested.The AIU reviews each member federation’s category every three years by examining factors such as athletes’ doping history and athlete support staff. However, he can change the federation category at any time during this three-year period.