The rise of India's 21st century women athletes

As archer Atanu Das and boxer Amit Panghal crashed out of the Tokyo Olympics in quarterfinal and pre-quarterfinal respectively, coinciding with Kamalpreet Kaur qualifying for the women’s discus throw final, a cheeky but instructive post on social media began doing the rounds: “From weddings to Olympics... India always expects women to bring home gold.”

Gold is just a metaphor here to reflect on how the Indian women have comfortably outperformed their male compatriots in the last Olympics and in the ongoing Summer Games so far. It’s been nine days into Tokyo 2020, and it’s the women athletes who have provided some succour to a medal-starved country at the biggest sporting meet.

From Manipuri weightlifter Mirabai Chanu’s silver to Assam boxer Lovlina Borgohain’s bronze, which she is confident of turning into a gold, India’s last four Olympic medals — including PV Sindhu’s silver and wrestler Sakshi Malik’s bronze at Rio 2016 — have all come from their women. After losing her badminton semifinal to Tai Tzu-ying on Saturday, Sindhu is in contention for a bronze medal in Tokyo.

Before we move on, let’s express our gratitude to the Northeastern part of India for it has now given us three of 17 individual Olympic medallists, and two of them in these Games alone.

Since the turn of the century, there has been a quiet revolution in Indian sport with women asserting their sporting credentials. And it all started at the turn of the millennium when something unprecedented happened - an elusive Olympic medal was won by an Indian woman for the first time.

As people stayed glued to their television sets in a pre-social-media era with the internet still in its nascent stages, a 25-year-old Karnam Malleswari made history at the 2000 Sydney Olympics. The weightlifter born in Voosavanipeta, a hamlet in Andra Pradesh, won the bronze medal after an effort of 110 kg in snatch and 130 kg in the clean and jerk category while competing in the women’s 54 kg event.

Read DH's Tokyo Olympics coverage here

A long wait finally had ended after PT Usha - the original poster girl of Indian sport - had come closest to achieving a similar feat at the 1984 Los Angeles, missing a podium finish by 0.01 seconds.

A jinx had been broken and so were many barriers for Indian women in sports.

Since then, India has seen an upward trend in the number of female athletes across varied disciplines. They are not only winning laurels at the international stage but are doing so by shattering societal prejudices along a path that’s mostly uncharted.

In the five summer Olympics in the 21st century, including the ongoing Tokyo Games, six out of the 14 individual medals so far have been won by female athletes who are always smaller in numbers compared to male athletes.

Apart from Malleswari in Sydney 2000, Sindhu, Sakshi in Rio 2016 and Chanu and Lovlina in Tokyo, Mary Kom and Saina Nehwal from the London Games in 2012 have won medals.

There has also been a gradual increase in the total number of women heading to the quadrennial event each time. While there were 21 women in 2000, 25 in 2004, 25 in 2008, 23 in 2012 it more than doubled to 54 in 2016 while the current contingent competing in the Tokyo Games has 57 women out of the 128 athletes.

Representation across different sports is not the only encouraging sign. What makes this year’s women contingent more appealing is the diversity in it. Athletes comprising mothers, teenagers, married, unmarried, LGBTQ+, those from bustling cities to the quiet hinterlands are all united in the quest to bring laurels. While an Olympic cut will no doubt put the spotlight on a sport previously unheard of by the masses, performances by unknown names in little-known sports have ensured the seed is sown for it to grow in popularity over the years.

For example, what Dipa Karmakar’s fourth-place finish at Rio Olympics did was to make people take notice that a girl could match the best in the world even without having access to world-class facilities growing up. Her achievement went on to be as celebrated as that of her fellow medallists at the Games.

Fast-forward to the present, trailblazers such as Bhavani Devi in fencing or Nethra Kumanan in sailing in these Games have managed to break the glass ceiling to make way for the rest to take an unfamiliar route.

Going back to where it all began, the first decade of the 21st century will remain as the most important period which saw multiple women athletes - equipped with a fearless brand of play - cement this determined attitude towards breaking barriers. To reverse narratives irrespective of the challenges that had denied so many before them of the bigger opportunities.

That was when a young girl from Manipur, who continues to dominate even after two decades, first came into the limelight. ‘Magnificient Mary’ has punched her way through all sorts of stereotypes: from boxing-is-a-man’s-sport rhetoric to mothers-cannot-be-elite-athletes jibe to constant questions about form and fitness for being on the ‘wrong side of 30’. Defying odds is second nature to Mary.

Even after winning the silver, Chanu was trolled by the faceless for the sport she has chosen as it robbed her of her “fertile” years when she should be producing babies instead of making the country proud.

Elsewhere, an Indian winning the 2003 Wimbledon Championship Girls’ doubles title made headlines. Sania Mirza had arrived with her blistering forehands and an on-court personality that garnered the kind of attention usually enjoyed by men cricketers.

While Anju Bobby George’s efforts once again resurrected athletics, somewhere else the Phogat sisters were wrestling their way through patriarchy. A revolution they started paved the way for a certain Sakshi Malik to shine with Vinesh Phogat now in the waiting to make history.

Another racket sport followed suit. Two superstars were born - Saina and Sindhu - who gave the Chinese a taste of their own medicine. The duo - performers on the big stage - showcased their hunger for winning with a brand of play hitherto unknown to Indian women shuttlers. Their on-court aggression and fearlessness were a novelty.

While the Indian society still puts multiple restrictions on a girl - from wearing t-shirts and shorts to playing under the sun, acts considered groom-repellents - there has been a gradual change in attitude towards women taking up sport. But their numbers are few and far between. For every Sindhu and Saina, whose parents stood behind them firmly in their pursuit of sporting excellence, you have several Rani Rampals (women’s hockey team captain) from Haryana and quartermiler Revathi Veeramani of Tamil Nadu who aren’t as privileged. To achieve what they have, they had to fight societal indignations reserved only for women.

In a country with a majority of the population still adamant about the well laid out “duties of a woman”, doing or being anything that falls outside its definition is considered a rebellious act. Despite these odds, women athletes have blazed a trail of their own.