Neeraj Yadav found dead beside SUV near Maujpur; woman friend says she met him hours earlier
Neeraj Yadav, a 42-year-old three-time Asian Para Games gold medallist, was found dead beside his SUV near Maujpur metro station in northeast Delhi on Monday night, police said. A woman who accompanied him told investigators she had met Yadav hours earlier and later brought him to hospital, and the death is being treated as a suspected suicide.
Yadav, who hailed from UP, ran the Anshneer Sports Academy in Sonipat, Haryana, and is survived by his wife and their three-year-old daughter. Diagnosed with post-polio residual paralysis at age seven, he played wheelchair tennis from 2005 to 2012 before switching to para-athletics and winning three gold medals at the 2015 Delhi State Athletics Meet in shot put, javelin and discus.
On the international stage, Yadav won gold in the men’s F55 javelin at the 2018 Asian Para Games in Jakarta with an Asian-record throw of 29.84 metres. He added two more Asian Para Games golds in Hangzhou in 2023, taking his career total at the event to three titles.
Yadav’s career was later affected by an anti-doping case: the National Anti-Doping Agency provisionally suspended him after an out-of-competition sample collected in Bengaluru in 2023 tested positive for stanozolol. He sought DNA testing of his sample during the anti-doping disciplinary process and was subsequently banned for four years.
Police said they received information from GTB Hospital at about 12.08 am on Tuesday that a person had been brought to the emergency department and declared dead by attending doctors. "A team reached Rajiv Gandhi Hospital, where the emergency services of GTB Hospital are currently being operated, and the body had already been shifted to GTB Hospital’s mortuary," an officer said.
During inquiry, a woman who had brought Yadav to hospital told police she had been friends with him since Dec 2025 and that she went to Sonipat on Oct 27 to meet him and tell him she could no longer remain in touch. She told police Yadav later dropped her off at Maujpur in his SUV and that around 9pm, when she returned to the area near Gate No. 1 of Maujpur metro station to check on him, she found him lying on the road beside his vehicle and rushed him to hospital.
Jafrabad police station has begun proceedings under BNSS Section 194, which deals with police inquiries and reports in cases of suicide and other unnatural deaths. "We have not found any suicide note or video," an officer said; a relative of Yadav said, "He had struggled, fought his way through difficulties and continued playing. It is difficult for me to believe that he could take the extreme step." The relative also said he was unaware of the woman who had accompanied Yadav before his death and called for her role to be examined.
India’s chief para-athletics coach S Satyanarayana suggested Yadav may have been under emotional distress after missing the Aichi-Nagoya Asian Para Games because of his doping suspension, saying, "Medals at the Asian Para Games can bring substantial govt cash awards. But his suspension had not ended, and he could not compete. It is possible this affected him deeply," he said.