Smashing gender bias: Sindhu, Saina tracing their own paths, not chasing male records | The Indian Express

Smashing gender bias: Sindhu, Saina tracing their own paths, not chasing male records | The Indian Express

Written by Shivani Naik |Updated: September 3, 2019 10:26:40 am

Smashing gender bias: Sindhu, Saina tracing their own paths, not chasing male records

Saina Nehwal and P V Sindhu have always known better than to measure their sporting arcs against male achievements. Why trot towards equality with men when you can gallop away to further greatness?

PV Sindhu and Saina Nehwal had this past to turn to but they still had to swim in uncharted waters when they played those big finals.

Had PV Sindhu — or Saina Nehwal before her — settled for merely equalling the stupendous feats of Prakash Padukone (1980) and Pullela Gopichand (2001) at All England, India would never have had three silvers (2015, 2017, 2018) and one precious gold (2019) at the Badminton World Championships. Keeping men as the benchmark has its obvious limitations in sport, as in life: Sometimes, when the moon is there for the taking, why go chasing after twinkling stars?