Indian athletes, especially women weightlifters, have done India proud at CWG 2018
That Indian women have been outperforming men at all international sporting events is an established fact, and the ongoing Commonwealth Games in Australia are no exception. To remember a recent victory, it was the Indian women who stole the show at the 2016 Rio Olympics. For that matter, women have been the stars in almost all events — be it tennis, wrestling, shooting, hockey, boxing or weightlifting (and even cricket though the men's team grabs all the attention). Our eves have registered consistent performances and have managed to increase the pool of medals for India at Olympics and Asian Games. To that extent, their performances in the opening days of the Gold Coast CWG are not unsurprising. Entering the sixth day, one of the bright spots for India has been the victories of Indian women athletes who have made the country proud by opening the medal chest. The total gold medal tally is already up to eight and the overall medal tally is at 17 including four silver and five bronze at the time of writing.
Women's table tennis got a major boost thanks to the excellent show by Manika Batra in the team event as her stunning singles led to the gold medal for the women's team and made her our youngest gold medal winner at the tender age of 16. In a first, the women's tennis team, which made it to the finals just for the second time (the first being at the Delhi 2010 CWG) produced a major upset by besting Singapore which had an enviable record of winning gold in the event ever since the discipline was inducted into the CWG series in 2002. But the string of heroic performances including those by our male athletes, was kicked off by our women weightlifters Punam Yadav, who won gold in the women’s 69kg event, Khumukcham Sanjita Chanu and Sanjita Chanu who between them have got us two golds more. Shooting ace Manu Bhaker provided the icing on the cake by winning the women’s 10m air pistol event.
Common to these victories, however, is the sobering fact that while their successes have made the country proud, it has not been a cakewalk for these young women. In a deeply misogynist society with an entrenched patriarchal culture extant, all of them have had to fight their battles to lead lives on their own terms though the nature of their struggle may have differed. What makes these string of victories truly worth celebrating, and not just as sporting achievements, is the fact that they have been registered at a huge cost. The women athletes have battled and overcome both institutional and social barriers. There is hardly a girl in India across the class, caste, community and urban-rural divides who has not faced sporting apartheid from the school-level itself where certain sports are still talked of openly as “boy's sports” — cricket, football, wrestling, hockey, boxing and weightlifting. The role played by trailblazers such as Mary Kom (boxing), Geeta Phogat (wrestling) and K Malleswari (weightlifting) among others cannot be underestimated. To have successfully defied gender stereotyping and becoming inspiring role models for other girls has been their immense contribution to the development of a sporting culture in India. But even when women athletes are able to convince their families about a future in sports, shabby, second-hand treatment usually awaits them by the mainly male sporting federation officials. That needs to end and Government intervention is vital to ensure a level playing field as well as greater sensitivity to women athletes' specific needs. On purely sporting grounds, though, we must keep in mind that the CWG is not in the top tier of international sporting events; after all, the big sporting powers such as China, US, Japan and Germany are not a part of the Games. But it's a good start and from here, momentum must be maintained clinch those elusive gold medals at the Olympics and world championships.