Top Indian middle-distance runner Parvej Khan, who recently gained attention in India for his performances in the NCAA circuit in the United States, has been provisionally suspended after failing a doping test.
The 19-year-old Khan could face a maximum ban of four years if found guilty of doping.
“Yes, he (Parvej Khan) has been provisionally suspended (by NADA) after failing a doping test,” a top source familiar with the matter told PTI on Friday. The start date of Khan’s provisional suspension by the National Anti-Doping Agency (NADA) is currently unknown, and the specific banned substance has not been confirmed.
It is likely that his sample was collected during the National Inter-State Championships held from June 27 to 30 in Panchkula, where he was competing in a domestic event for the first time since the National Inter-State Championships in Bhubaneswar in June 2023. During the Panchkula event, Khan won the men’s 1500m gold with a time of 3:42.95, although he missed the Paris Olympics qualifying standard of 3:33.50 by a significant margin.
Khan had been celebrated as a rising star in Indian athletics after becoming the first Indian to qualify for a track event final at the NCAA Championships in the United States earlier this year. He is currently studying at the University of Florida on a scholarship.
Hailing from a poor farming family in Chahalka village in the Mewat region of Haryana, less than 100km from New Delhi, Khan won the 1500m gold at the 2022 National Games in Gandhinagar with a personal best of 3:40.89. He also clinched the 800m gold at the U-16 Nationals in Mangalagiri, Andhra Pradesh, in 2019 and took bronze in the same event at the Khelo India Youth Games (U-18) the following year. His first senior victory came in the 1500m at the National Open Championships in Warangal in 2021.
Khan won a silver in the 1500m at the National Inter-State Senior Athletics Championships in Chennai in 2022 and took gold in the same event at the National Open in Bengaluru that year. He set a personal best time of 3:36.21 in the 1500m at the Portland Track Festival on June 9 in the USA, the second-fastest time by an Indian, just behind Jinson Johnson’s national record of 3:35.24 set in 2019.
