I will always remember a smiling and very girl-next-door Vinesh Phogat happily eating a pizza with some of our team members in Birmingham, the day after she had won the Gold Medal at the Commonwealth Games. I had seen her medal winning match, but I first met her the next day when we were going in for Nikhat Zareen’s bout. We spotted Vinesh and Anshu Malik, her fellow wrestler who had won bronze, hanging outside the entrance of the boxing venue. They didn’t have tickets and wanted to watch the bout, and I was surprised. I remembered that even medal winning athletes had not been offered some kind of access by the Indian contingent. We managed to get them a couple of tickets right up front, and they happily accepted, though Vinesh was seemingly taken aback that somebody was offering her their ticket. No sense of entitlement, no sense of privilege there, just somebody who wanted to cheer her friend and was grateful to be able to do that.
We watched Zareen take gold, and Vinesh was screaming while the bout was on – ‘phod de Nikhat’. Watching her cheer Zareen, I realised how organic it was to her – to take on an opponent and break them up – she was a fighter and she expected nothing less from other women. After Nikhat’s win, she and we too ran up to the ring to congratulate and Vinesh hugged Nikhat, a moment also picked up by the host broadcaster and seen by thousands of viewers back home.
I’ve admired this spirited girl ever since, and when she attended the first RevSportz conclave in 2023 we met again, and she spoke on my panel about her fight against the establishment. It was the first time after the wrestlers’ protest in Delhi that she had spoken at a public event, and every member of the audience hung onto her every word.
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When young Antim Panghal qualified in the 53 kg category, it had seemed that Vinesh was done – that her Olympics dream was over. And again she surprised all of us. I remember telling a colleague after hearing that she had gotten her Olympic quota that I was going to look out for her there. To that he had replied it wouldn’t be so easy – playing in another weight category where she hasn’t played before, and unseeded, it was going to be more than just difficult.
And then imagine my joy, when at the mixed zone, post Neeraj Chopra’s qualifying round in Paris, somebody jubilantly gestured across the room. The person was so excited that he even got a deep cut in his leg trying to hurry across to us! For some moments we forgot the existence of Neeraj – Vinesh had done the unthinkable. She had defeated the almost invincible and world number 1, Yui Susaki.
The next day we went to watch her medal bout, heart in mouth every second of that fight, cheering madly when she made it. We ran to the mixed zone and she was rushing to give her weight. I was at the end of the line, and shouted, ‘great going Vinesh’. She looked at me and smiled proudly, possibly registering recognition.
That’s how I want to remember her – not how she has been since, desperate and distressed. But also, she is so strong that she will come back in another way, I’m sure of it. Her struggle makes her, not the missed medal. In her tears yesterday, after landing back home, she was every woman. Vinesh is not about medals only, not only about a fight well-fought. Vinesh is also about vulnerability, about what she lost and how she will get her life back now.
We’re all watching her. She stays my hero.
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