India's sports minister and the country's lone Olympic champion on Monday hit out at cricketers for refusing to divulge their daily location under an anti-doping code. “All sportspersons should adhere to it and happily follow it,” Sports Minister Manohar Singh Gill told reporters a day after the nation's top cricketers declined to comply with the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) code. “The world is concerned about doping and we should support WADA. India has accepted regulatory testing and we adhere to it. “It should be made clear to sportspersons that testing does not interfere in anyone's personal life.” The Olympic Council of Asia (OCA) chief has also urged the cricketers to accept the “whereabouts” rule. OCA Secretary-General Randhir Singh dismissed the cricketers' concerns. “The players must fall in line with the WADA clause,” Singh told Reuters on Monday. “The international body (ICC) recognizes the code. They should look into the problem and solve it.” “Security is not only for these 10 or 11 players, it is there for thousands of other sportsmen around the world,” Singh said. “We must follow rules and regulations, not try and create any controversy this time.” Adherence to the WADA rules has become even more important with cricket part of the 2010 Asian Games program, but Singh was confident India would comply with the doping clause soon. The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) on Sunday gave its blessing to players who did not accept the whereabouts clause of the WADA code, saying it infringed on their privacy. The clause requires players to detail their whereabouts for an hour between 6:00 A.M. and 11:00 P.M. every day for the next three months to allow random out-of-competition testing. Olympic shooting gold medalist Abhinav Bindra urged the cricketers to accept the code, saying the clause was “no big deal”. India's top players are the only ones in world cricket, a non-Olympic discipline, who had not signed the WADA documents by the August 1 deadline set by the International Cricket Council. According to WADA rules, anyone missing three doping tests over 18 months faces a ban of up to two years.
