Hima Das

Some stories of these kinds make usual snippets in many Hindi newspapers around big sports events. Though, these stories, which are posed as individual heroic one and less of a critical approach to see the working of sports administration, are meant to be sensational and don’t do justice to the entire sports affairs in India.

The Asian Games 2018 at Jakarta, Indonesia has ended now. It has been a good run, to be expected from 541 (277 men and 247 women) Indian athletes who participated, with some expected wins and some unexpected losses.

In midst of all this, there are some inspiring and promising stories which needed special mention in order to reflect on sports affairs in India. Some athletes who went ahead against all odds not only represented India but also won the medals. Personally, I was thrilled to see three athletes making a cut into ‘elite’ club of medal winner. Dutee Chand and Hima Das in Track and Field and Divya Kakran in Wrestling are to be mentioned. These three impressive performances came in Asian Games representing a country where dowry and ‘honour’ killings are still living reality.
Institutions like Khap Panchayats still dictate the terms for women and their movements with wider social sanction from society and religion. On top of that the sports administration is not gender neutral! Women sports-persons are not taken seriously or not provided with the support system they needed! Though there are few exceptions, but generally the situation is grave.

Dutee Chand

Dutee Chand doesn’t come from an affluent family background and has battled underprivileged conditions of all sort in a distant corner of Odisha. This young and promising athlete didn’t have very smooth carrier from early age of 17. Her performances range from holding a National record to winning bronze in Junior Asian Championship and from being the first Indian athlete (at the age of 17!!) to enter IAAF (International Amateur Athletic Federation) World Championship to getting Olympic berth. At this young age, these are achievements any athlete, irrespective of their gender, will die for!

However, it was not the challenges on the track but ‘off-the-track’ which were multi-fold. Her gender was in question as she was banned to participate in Rio Olympics. IAAF found ‘extra testosterone’ in her body which means she wasn’t enough ‘woman’. ‘Science’ was used to define the ‘enough’ or ‘less’ womanhood that made Dutee Chand disqualify from 3 major events. This was the time when federation should have stepped in and stood next to her in this difficult time. Unfortunately, she wasn’t the Yuvraj Singh of Cricket, who was greatly backed up by BCCI during his cancer treatment. This pushed Dutee Chand in the dark and she was lost in between. Her Coach N Ramesh, Badminton Coach P. Gopichand and Bruce Kidd, a former athlete from Canada, were few individuals who believed in her and stood by her. She had to go the arbitration to prove her legitimacy; essentially to prove her gender!

The ‘sensational’ media was in action again. Indian newspapers were filled with those ‘allegations’ on her, which no-one even cared to understand, respond or defend. The mass hysteria works as such that these ‘allegations’ came out through brutal gaze towards Dutee Chand.  She could not stay around the sports fraternity and had to take refuge in Gopichand’s academy in Hyderabad.

The support system male athletes are entitled to get in India are just not available (with some exception) to women athlete at all! The overall scenario works like that! However, she fought back on her own and now very much celebrated by all those who backed out in the time she needed them the most. Dutee Chand’s performance promises that she has many more years and many more achievements waiting for her. The colour of her silver medal in Jakarta truly represents her struggles at many fronts which should put these male-dominated federations in remorse and shame.

When Karnam Malleshwari became the first Indian woman to win an Olympic medal everyone noticed that Indian women are also participating in Olympics. PT Usha did the same after winning multiple medals at Asia Games. I remember after bronze in Weightlifting everyone wanted to take credit for Malleshwari’s success. A successful male athlete can spare his credits for friends, family, coach and God. But, given the gender bias in Indian society, it is not possible for women athlete. Everyone jumped to take credit for her success. ‘Even (though) she was a woman, but I knew that she is going to make India proud’. This kind of common phrases from sports federations’ male officials summarize everything.

Hima Das’s success came through something similar like that. First, her gold medal at Junior World Championship and then 1 silver and 1 gold medal at Jakarta Asian Games made her immediate star overnight. She became first Indian woman Athlete to win at any level of World Championship. Hima Das is one of the top 5 athletes running in circuit right now and had so much potential in future. Though many sports federations and governments announced cash and kind prizes for her, but I wonder if this support will go much further than that? I wonder what if she would get stuck in a similar situation like Dutee Chand’s? Would the Federation withdraw themselves as they did in Dutee Chand’s case or would they back her? My hunch is that they will withdraw! (Though, I want to be proved wrong)

My assumptions have a material base as well. Whereas her difficult journey to overcome patriarchy and poverty would have been inspiring for all, but most of the people found looking for her caste background in internet. This casteist quest to know her caste seems to overshadow her years of hard training and struggles. She knows that this journey from her family’s paddy fields to track & field will have many of these continuous obstacles of casteism and patriarchy.

In this regard, wrestling seems to sort out bit of it. From the movie Dangal, the world got to know about the women wrestling scene in India (read North). Overnight Geeta Phogat became the household name, Mahavir became the liberal father and Haryana became the nursery of women wrestling. Popular image of Haryana also got little better because of it. This shift was changing the narrative from Caste and ‘honour’ related killing to women empowerment. (Geeta became the face of Beti Bachao Beti padhao). There is no denying in any of those stories (in some sense!) but, there is more to it. Especially when one try to un-weave the caste dynamics of it.

Divya bharat kesari

In nutshell, wrestling in India is dominated by dominant castes like; Jats or upper castes. No wonder most of the women players will come from these castes only. This has become an accepted norm from ushering years of women wrestling in India. With this background, Divya Kakran, coming from backward caste from a working-class neighbourhood in Delhi established herself. Unfolding her struggles had many aspects, caste is just one of it. In May 2017, Divya won a silver medal in Asian championship held in Delhi and in March 2018, she defeated Geeta Phogat quite comfortably in Bharat Kesari Dangal. These two were quite promising from many other performances from her kitty. Her performance at Jakarta Asian Games brought her bronze medal.

Divya, a daughter of homemaker mother and street-tailor father didn’t have financial resources to try big in wrestling. Unlike others, she neither did have a father like Mahavir who made decent money from property boom in Delhi/NCR nor did she have a larger clan support system to carry forward an expensive and demanding sport like wrestling. She had to fight the hardest battle in some of the miserable conditions. She got trained at Premnath’s Akhara in GurMandi, majorly a Dalit/Backward Caste neighbourhood.  Despite having Divya and many other promising junior level women wrestlers, the Akhara is in miserable condition even now. The building is not in ideal condition to produce national level players let alone that players who can compete in world level.

A cursory (but clearly myopic) look at immediate history of wrestling in India will give any reader a sense that it is popular either among well-to-do communities (read Brahmins) or rural/agrarian castes in North Indian state of Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and Punjab, (Jats, Gujjars and Ahirs). But, when one looks beneath this popular understanding it will be found that others (Dalit/OBCs and Muslims) have had their fair share in wrestling development in India. From Idgahi Maidan at Jama Masjid to numerous working class Akharas in and around industrial Delhi had a vibrant wrestling culture. Though, these Akharas fizzled out slowly, some with the decline and shift of industrial Delhi and some without any patronage from government.

Let’s not deny the fact that sports in India is not a ‘modern’ way of living (except cricket;). People still don’t look up to sports with due respect. It definitely makes people proud in these moments during big events, but it ends there! A popular saying from our childhood, पढ़ोगे लिखोगे बनोगे नवाब, खेलोगे कूदोगे बनोगे ख़राब, echoes this perfectly. On top of that, Women athletes have added pressure, expectations and post-carrier struggles and the respective federations should better understand that! Even if it is very new and hard for them to know!

There are numerous other stories which has made it or in making like these three. They need much more constant support as an equal individual from this casteist and patriarchal social setup, which is reckoning same in these federations as well.

First published on Kafila.online
 

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As it was strictly meant for male pahalwans, women were not even allowed to watch them fighting, let alone participating. Something similar to Khap Panchayats, where women still are not welcome. Women are the fairly latecomers in wrestling arena and yet not so welcome. In this context to make a film on the emergence and development of women wrestling in India itself is a fascinating idea.

Gama Pahalwan at Eidgahi

Dangal, the movie is based on a true story of Mahavir and his firebrand daughters and their ‘quietly’ active mother. It is an important movie to watch for many reasons. Firstly, it portrays a father who wanted his daughters to pursue something (wrestling) which was un-imaginable in those days. It reveals what it took for the first generation of women wrestlers to break those masculine stereotypes and depicts the overall impression of wrestling in the realm of sports culture in India. There are so many moments in the film to cheer about, to get goosebumps (at least I got many). Writing review is an unknown territory for me but there is a personal reason to taking to this venture of writing.  The release of this film forced me to say something which, as a former wrestler for almost ten years, is still left with me.  When Geeta came back from National Sports Academy (NSA), Patiala, she was a changed woman. She is no more a girl who just won the gold medal in national games. She has grown her hair, watched couple of cinemas in Patiala, ate gol guppas, had nail paints etc. These were some moments of pleasure which she was deprived of by her father (Mahavir) in Balali village, Bhivani in Haryana. Mahavir noticed these changes and kept sulking. He didn’t say a word. When she went to her father’s Akhara, she also tried to change the way Mahavir was teaching wrestling till now. Mahavir’s masculinity got hustled and in response he tried to teach Geeta a lesson, but eventually lost to her. This might be seen as one of the passing scenes in the movie, but for me, it says a lot! Mahavir who was always sure about his way of life and teaching was lost to his own daughter whom he taught. It was hard for him to accept. The defeat from his own daughter, a girl, hurt his masculinity deeply. A patriarch was made to taste the mud in his own den. There was no coming back from there. No sign of truce or repentance from Geeta. Masculinity is not always challenged by big events, with a grand opening. Patriarch(ies) are and have been challenged in bits and pieces, in small steps, quietly. That is way too hard to digest and especially difficult when you come from a place like Haryana where women succumb to death in order to break gender stereotypes. Many cases of killing in the name of honour are living example in this region.

Lets take a look at another scene which was appealing in its own narrative. When Mahavir took Geeta to Rohtak to participate in one of the first Dangal of her life, she was looked down upon, taunted, made fun off with her father. In real life it wasn’t one of the easiest moments for Mahavir, let alone Geeta, who was 13 at that time. Women in Haryana are particularly domesticated with all those taunts by men, but men are not warmed up to all these. They don’t know how to take shame. It is as if they are not ready for it. The most commendable thing which came out here is what happened when Mahavir decided to put Geeta in front of thousands of male spectators, no matter how much shame it brings it to him. Eventually, Mahavir and Geeta had the last word. He was more ashamed by the public in general and his clan members in particular. The scene, where she tells his opponent male pahalwan, chori samajhke mat ladiyo, was an evocative one. This says a lot about the ways in which girls have been been typecast by all Haryanvi society and mards around her!

In an appealing scene, which might have been missed by many, Geeta Phogat won the gold medal at Commonwealth Games, 2010 in Delhi. The national anthem was played, but that wasn’t what Geeta was cheering for/ overwhelmed about! She was looking for her father in stands, who wasn’t there! And when she saw him, she ran towards him and gave him the medal. The moment of winning a gold medal at the Commonwealth was a proud moment for her, her father and her family than it was for the country. The film revolves around the personal and social spaces in which Phogat sisters and Mahavir are situated and not in the spaces of nation, nationalism or patriotism. Geeta’s achievement was more pronounced because she fought and won a battle against all obstacles set out by a dominant and exploitative society. She owed her success only to her parents/father and family not to any nation/national sports body. Playing for India was merely a departure moment here and not the defining one. She could see and anyone who has little acquaintance with wrestling and the social circle around it will tell you that the achievement is more important for Geeta (or any other woman wrestler) because it enabled her to overcome the constant fear and shame.  It challenges the blindness which denies to see women as equal human being in the region from where she comes from.

Geeta Phogat in world championship
 

Her belief in her father more than the national team coach also confirms the stature of sports (minus cricket) in this country. In this context, I can recall the recent example of Narsingh-Sushil Kumar drama which had reached the court. This incident also shows how contaminated the sports administration in general and Wrestling federation in particular has become. Moreover, the women teams have been thoroughly neglected (materially as well as socially) in order to discourage them rather than encouraging them to fight it out. The coaches have their own favouritism and are least serious regarding the team performances. Not surprisingly, the position of women team’s coach has been considered as a position of punishment. The recent coach of the team (who also assisted Amir Khan in the film) Kripa Shankar was a forgotten/unsung hero who comes from Madhya Pradesh and not from the north lobby (Haryana, Punjab administrators dominate the wrestling’s highest body in India). Even the current Wrestling Federation of India chief, Brij Bhushan Saran Singh, a BJP member of parliament is from Uttar Pradesh and has no distant relationship with wrestling!

In a country, where the cases of women players’ molestation and rampant bias are common, (one must not forget the case of women hockey players who were constantly molested by the head coach and when they raised their voices, they were shown the door), it is important to ask where would one go to regain their strength, assurance, confidence and trust? For Geeta and many others (given the lack of any other spaces to rely upon), it was her father, who became sutradaar to reach where she was in 2010 despite all the odds against women entering the wrestling arena.

The hard-core training could seem comical to some and frustrating to many when they do not understand the context. it is often traumatic, indeed frustrating and could be seen forced, but we must ask are there any other ways to deal with it? The film and the social context might not have a straight sociological answer for that and we may not always look for an answer. On explaining further, it is not easy to get away with caste and gender barriers in a society where lines are demarcated so sharply and doing anything in this regard could be ‘sehat ke liye haanikaarak’ sometime! Mahavir and his daughter did take that risk and overcome it. It may not appear perfect, but for the time being, this attempt/endeavour was necessary.

Sometime the linguistic grammar can not express the grammar of actions and their impact on larger canvas. Mahavir’s life is one such example. He might emerged as stubborn, choleric and unpalatable, but the actions posed throughout the film has larger implications. He was not there to champion the cause of gender justice, but the emergence of Geeta and other women’s barging in the ‘all-male club’ certainly paved the way for that. This is a welcome step, given the limited access to anything ‘social’ to women. This film has its own narrative and it is completely fine if it doesn’t suit our notions and convictions. Mahavir might have won via Geeta through his perseverance, but he lost in bits and pieces, quietly to her as well. Dangal stands apart from many other sports movies (Chak De India, Mary Kom etc.), it neither sets high claims, nor tried to achieve them. It’s a tale of unsung struggles and overcoming them.
 

The Phogat family

 
Praveen Verma was a wrestler for more than ten years, and ended up in University by chance! He is now doing PhD from Department of History and is also with NSI.

Courtesy: Kafila.online
 

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