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been led out of the shed, their troughs filled with feed. Daya is
laying out the buckets she will use for milking.
Mahavir opens his eyes abruptly, pulls out his phone and
scolds someone at the other end: Wheres your daughter? We
start in five minutes. Tell her to run.
He stands up and shuffles towards the house. Its not a house.
Its a large wrestling hall: a double-sized mat on one side, top-ofthe-line weight machines in another, thick ropes dangling from
the high ceiling, and a series of small windows overlooking lush
farmland.
Mahavirs six girls are the first on the matGeeta, Babita,
Ritu, Sangeeta, Vinesh and Priyankaall dressed in dry-fit tees
and training tights. Two more girls come running in. Then three
boys. Warm up, Mahavir barks, pointing to the mat.
That there are girls wrestling at all, in these rural settings, is
in itself a miracle, let alone the quality of international success
they have managed.94
Geeta is a gentle, soft-spoken woman with an aquiline nose
and an easy smile. She is the only one of the six sisters with long
hair, which she ties in a high ponytail during her bouts. The rest
have identical short crops that barely cross the nape. As the eldest
sister, Geeta has forged a remarkable path for the rest to follow
Commonwealth Games (CWG) gold in 2010 was followed by
a bronze at the 2012 World Championship, a first for Indian
women; then she qualified for the Olympics. The sisters are not
far behind. Babita won silver at the 2010 CWG, and gold at the
2014 version, where Vinesh also won gold. Ritu has every major
international medal at the junior level (including multiple World
Championships), and is about to make her leap to the senior team.
Sangeeta and Priyanka have medals from junior Asian
Championships.
What if all six of them land up in the same competition one
day, and all of them finish with medals?
Let that be the Olympics! Babita is thrilled with the idea. It
has occurred to her before.
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Well, perhaps not all six. Lets say three, Geeta says. Now
thats not fantasythat can happen in Rio.95
Yes, and then papa will finally say Now Babita makes her
voice heavy and manly: Fine, not bad. Now you can rest a little.
The sisters laugh.
Despite Chandgi Rams efforts, no village in India has a
wrestling school where women are allowed, except here, in
Balali. Even in the cities, the number of private akhadas that
allow women can be counted on your fingersJabbars centre
in Meerut; Indore, where former Olympian Kripa Shankar Patel
campaigns for akhadas to open their doors to women, and runs
his own centre; Rohtak, where the University of Rohtak runs a
popular training centre; former Olympian Prem Naths akhada
in Delhi; Deepikas school.96
Chandgi Rams campaign has spread, more than a decade
later, and consolidated in these little pockets of resistance.
The general atmosphere is still strongly against women in
wrestling, says Kripa Shankar, who was a former coach with the
national womens team.
His family, who have been in wrestling for generations, were
Chandgi Rams chief patron when he opened his vyayamshala.
We have a very small talent pool to pick from, Kripa Shankar
says. Maharashtra, which produces hundreds of male wrestlers,
has nothing for women. Madhya Pradesh has very little, Jabbar
Singh is alone in Uttar Pradesh. Only Haryana is really trying.
Womens wrestling is still new to the world, and we could have
stepped ahead, taken the lead and dominated it for years. But no,
we are stuck being backwards, judgemental and idiotic.
Not Mahavir, not in Balali.
Masterji opened my eyes, Mahavir says. He used to tell me,
What you are doing for your girls, you will see one day that it
will bring you great happiness. So keep doing it, dont be scared,
face your difficulties like you face opponents, and be deaf to the
criticism.
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