In Praise Of Dipa Karmakar

Who became the first Indian woman gymnast to qualify for the Olympics. If that wasn’t historic enough, the 22-year-old won the gold medal in the vaults finals in an international event at Rio which will host the Olympic Games in August. That made her the first Indian to win gold in a global gymnastic competition. She was already the first Indian woman gymnast to win a medal—a bronze—in the Commonwealth Games, in 2014. Despite the congratulatory messages from Modi and Tendulkar, the 5-foot-tall athlete still faces huge challenges. The biggest is that, typical of Indian sport, there is a tussle between two rival gymnastics federation factions. In India’s proudest hour in gymnastics, it doesn’t have a unified functioning federation. Fortunately, Dipa has shown that she has the determination and ambition to vault over seemingly insurmountable odds.