TOI Exclusive: Olympian Tulika Maan temporarily suspended by NADA, will miss Glasgow CWG

Tulika Maan of India (PTI photo) New Delhi: India’s Commonwealth Games campaign suffered another major blow as Olympian and Birmingham 2022 CWG silver medalist Tulika Maan was provisionally suspended by the National Anti-Doping Agency (NADA) over alleged whereabouts errors, ending her participation in Glasgow 2026 without even leaving India.Sources told TOI that Tulika, one of India’s brightest medal prospects in the women’s over 78kg judo category, had accumulated three whereabouts failures in a 12-month period, prompting a temporary suspension under the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) code. She has been summoned by NADA and is due to appear before the anti-doping body on Thursday.Failure to reside is an anti-doping compliance issue that includes recordkeeping failures and missed tests. An application failure occurs when an athlete fails to submit or update the mandatory out-of-competition testing location information, while a missed test is recorded when the DCO is unable to locate the athlete within the declared 60-minute testing window. Any combination of three failed submissions or missed tests within a 12-month period constitutes an anti-doping rule violation and carries a standard penalty of two years if not successfully challenged. Tulik’s provisional suspension comes as another blow to India’s CWG preparations. The Indian contingent has now been reduced to 122 athletes, with the heavyweight judoka set to miss the Games after a temporary suspension. The Indian judo team is scheduled to leave for Glasgow on July 27, with the competitions starting on July 31.The 27-year-old has been one of the leading faces of Indian judo for the past decade. Raised by her mother, Delhi Police sub-inspector Amrita, after losing her father at a young age, Tulika switched from football to judo at the age of eight before making it big under coach Yashpal Solanki.Her breakthrough moment came at the CWG 2022 in Birmingham, where she won the silver medal in the women’s over 78 kg category, becoming only the second Indian judoka to do so. She later battled a serious knee injury to qualify for the Paris Olympics where she represented India as the country’s only female judoka.The interim suspension now casts a shadow over the career of one of India’s most respected judokas, with the final outcome dependent on proceedings before NADA. If confirmed, Tulika could face a ban of up to two years, a major blow to her career as well as India’s future medal hopes.