A defiant Vinesh Phogat took the Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) head-on as she showed up at the National Open Ranking tournament venue at Nandini Nagar in UP’s Gonda on Monday despite the federation declaring her ineligible till June 26 due to the mandatory six-month notice period for athletes returning from retirement under anti-doping rules.Even as the Olympian said she had replied to a show-cause notice issued by the WFI, the federation refused to accept her documents. The WFI cited four violations—disqualification from the 2024 Paris Olympics for failing to make weight; the whereabouts failures under anti-doping rules; failure to intimate in time about her comeback; and her competing in two weight categories (50kg and 53kg) during the selection trials held in March 2024 by the then Indian Olympic Association-appointed ad-hoc panel.The wrestler called the WFI’s action a “pre-planned conspiracy” to stop her comeback. Talking to the media, she said she had been cleared by the International Testing Agency to compete and, therefore, could not be held responsible for other charges. “What do you expect me to do? Shall I take ‘sanyaas’ and stay away? Accept defeat? So that their conspiracy against me succeeds?” Vinesh said after meeting WFI president Sanjay Singh.She further clarified that she would be sending a detailed reply to the notice with supporting evidence to “establish her innocence”.Vinesh, who is the Congress MLA from Julana in Haryana’s Jind district, said, “All I am asking is a fair chance to compete, but they are insisting that first I reply to their notice. If I had violated any rule, NADA or WADA would have given me a show-cause notice or banned me. Even after that, I underwent doping tests and came out clean. I have always been clean in sports.”She clarified that contrary to the WFI eligibility date of June 26, 2026 (mentioned in their notice), she had been deemed eligible to return to official training and competition on January 1, 2026. “I have official confirmation from the International Testing Agency, the agency hired by the international federation UWW, the relevant body governing doping control for wrestling,” she posted on social media platform X.Vinesh claimed the allegation that she violated rules by participating in two separate weight categories at the 2024 selection trials at NIS-Patiala was also false as the ad-hoc committee governing the WFI then was aware of her participation and didn’t object to it.