Exactly four months after the curtain came down on the much-hyped National Games at Hyderabad and Visakhapatnam, the cat is out of the bag. As many as 22 contestants, including the fastest man and woman and 15 others who won medals at the Games, have tested positive for performance-enhancing drugs. Predictably, the athletes are pleading ignorance or passing the baton to coaches and managers. "If justice is not done to me, I will not hesitate to expose the real villains in the doping scandal," says Udayalaxmi Peddinedi, the 400 m hurdles gold winner at the Games. She claims to be a victim of a conspiracy that sought to take hosts Andhra Pradesh to the head of the medals tally. As many as nine of the 22 represented the state.

Men's 100 m gold medalist Jagdish Basak has been banned for two years

The Amateur Athletics Federation of India (AAFI) has suspended Punjab athlete Jagdish Basak for testing positive for an anabolic steroid. The other suspension is that of Andhra Pradesh's Kalyani Alapati who also tested positive for an anabolic steroid. Four other athletes-Hridayanand Singh, Maha Singh, Ramandip Singh and Sukhjinder Singh-who tested positive for stimulants like mephentermine and ephedrine have been warned. The cases of athletes Kavita Pandya of Maharashtra and Peddinedi of Andhra Pradesh are pending.

Mandarins of sport in Andhra Pradesh dismiss accusations of having encouraged drug abuse. "We were determined to conduct a drugs-free Games and, therefore, invested in dope-kits for testing and ensured competition was on a level field," says L.V. Subrahmanyam, vice-chairman, Sports Authority of Andhra Pradesh. Yet, led by the Andhra Pradesh Olympic Association President H. J. Dora and Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu, they had consistently lured medal prospects from other states with monetary inducements.

The doping scandal represents the biggest blot in India's sporting history and threatens to devastate the sporting establishment. Both the fastest man, Basak, and woman, Pandya, of the Games (winners of the 100 m dash) are on the tainted list. Clearly, the "import" policy with cash incentives was a contributory factor that will haunt the Andhra Pradesh Government and the sports brass for some time.

Yet, it is not just Andhra Pradesh that is to blame. What the latest bombshell has established is that in many National Institute of Sports camps, aspiring athletes have taken performance-enhancing injections in collusion with coaches. "Today the youth want to do everything in just a year through the intake of drugs," says legendary athlete Milkha Singh.

Women's 100 m winner Kavita Pandya has been placed under temporary suspension

The fallout, however, is tragic and comic in equal measure. Cyclist Nijappa Yentethu-who won gold, silver and bronze and says he took a cough syrup in consultation with his coach-claims regulations specify that a contestant can be punished only in relation to the event for which the dope test was done. By that calculation he is to be stripped only of a bronze medal and will still get Rs 5 lakh as promised by Naidu.

Swimmer Amar Muralidharan is falling back on the anti-doping regulations of FINA, the international swimming federation, to absolve himself of the charge of steroid abuse. It allows him to undergo three more tests without advance notice over the next three months before the charge is made to stick. Some other athletes will most certainly contest the current testing procedures in India.

The only dope testing laboratory, the Sports Authority of India's facility in Delhi, is not an accredited one but is expected to get its certification before the first Afro-Asian Games are held in Hyderabad later in the year. "This is a major problem and we are in the process of raising the standards of the laboratory and testing," admits Indian Olympic Association (IOA) Secretary-General Randhir Singh. Currently, there is no alternative laboratory where the second sample can be sent. The International Olympic Committee downgraded the only accredited laboratory in Asia at Seoul after the controversy involving track star Sunita Rani. Worse still, individual sport organisations view cases of doping with varying severity. Those found to have taken anabolic steroids face a more stringent punishment than those taking stimulants.

For Indian sport, the signs are ominous. Earlier this month, former world junior weightlifting champion Shailaja Pujari was dropped from the team for the Commonwealth championships to be held in Tonga in May. She was asked to leave the coaching camp at the National Institute of Sports, Patiala, after testing positive. She has already been suspended for six months on a similar charge. She had won three gold medals in the 75 kg class at the 2001 Manchester Commonwealth Games.

Jogu had won silver in the light fly class

The IOA has given the guilty athletes an April 30 deadline to depose before its medical commission. In case they fail to turn up, it will be presumed that "that they have nothing to state in their defence", IOA officials say, adding that strict action would be taken against the athletes found guilty after the hearing. Says AAFI Secretary Lalit Bhanot: "We are committed to taking on the menace of any performance-enhancing drug in a serious manner."

Whether or not the IOA's crackdown succeeds in deterring other athletes from using drugs, the damage has been done. The scandal has exposed the truth, long suspected, that coaches, athletes and sports administrators form an unholy trinity in encouraging drug use to ensure more medals and greater personal glory, ignoring the long-term damage to the country's image and its overall athletic performance. As it is, India's quest for a medal in athletics at the Olympics has been a dismal failure. With the 2004 Olympics scheduled in Athens, Indian sports resembles nothing less than a Greek tragedy.

— with Sayantan Chakravarty