Support for women in sport is growing in India but there is still a long way to go, feels badminton star Jwala Gutta. Her words carry extra significance in light of the experience at the Tokyo Olympics, where three of the seven medal-winners from India are women. Jwala Gutta, who has made India proud at numerous global badminton tournaments, was speaking at a Ficci Yflo event in Ahmedabad titled ‘The game-flow with Jwala.’
The event was meant to discuss the sports scenario and provide encouragement to women in sports. Ficci Yflo conducts this event every month in different cities with different personalities across the nation to encourage women and youngsters.
Gutta was asked about the large women contingent from India this time at the Olympics. The country sent 56 female athletes in 18 sports, the largest number so far for India.“The numbers are never enough as we are still fighting for equal opportunities,” Gutta said.
She talked about how women are neglected in a lot of fields. She acknowledged that “support for women is growing… it will only get better. But there is still a lot to do and a long way to go,” she added.
Gutta was the first-ever Indian woman badminton player to qualify for the Olympics and paved the way for the likes of P V Sindhu. “There’s still a long way to go. The whole system for sports need a revamp,” Gutta emphasised. “I’ve been fighting for it a lot — for equal opportunities [for women],” she said. She said the proverbial ball of India’s sporting future and especially the future of Indian women in sports, is in the court of the next generation.
Gutta runs her academy in Moinabad, Telangana, for which she has a lot of plans.
She said, “I am ready to welcome anybody and everybody irrespective of gender. I don’t believe in training them to become champions only on court and not champions otherwise — that is something I don’t preach. I teach them to be a champion everywhere; that’s what my coach taught me.”
Gutta is known for being an aggressive player on the court. “I am a very animated person. I show what I feel on my face. when other players do it they don’t mind but whenever a woman shows she’s fearless they are termed aggressive.,” she said.
She, however, said there has been an increase in funding which according to her has been the key factor which helped medal winners like Neeraj Chopra, Sindhu, the men’s hockey team, and Mirabai Chanu. She said she did not have this kind of support when she was ranked No. 6 in the world. The government was doing its bit but private companies must step in to make the sports field better organised and more professional, she said: “India can have a lot of athletes if they are supported in their growing years.”
She also spoke about her father being a feminist. He always pushed her to be a fearless go-getter, she said. Since childhood she was taught to take part in sports and be confident.
That self-confidence, she said, is what helped her not get flustered with trolls on social media who even sometimes call her — someone whose great grandfather was a Gandhian & was a batch-mate of Rabindranath Tagore — not Indian.
