Hima Das became the first Indian athlete to win a gold medal in a track event at the World Junior Athletics Championship in July. That she is only 18 years old and hails from Assam is what makes her achievement even more special. Bollywood, where biopics are the current flavour of the season, already senses a potential candidate in Das. Akshay Kumar, while promoting his new film Gold, expressed interest in making a movie on Das’ life.
Here we take a look at the other worthy candidates for a biopic.
Santhi Soundararajan
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Image Courtesy: MensXP.com
She came second in the 800m race at the Asian Games held in Doha in 2006 only to be stripped of her honours after failing to qualify a gender test. She was stripped of her all her national and international medals. It was later found that her system contained high levels of androgens, a typical male sex hormone. It was only recently that this Dalit girl finally managed to secure a permanent job that’d help her make ends meet.
Man Kaur
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Image Courtesy: npr.org
Imagine taking one and a half minutes to finish a hundred meter race and still managing to come first. The 100-year-old does this and a victory pose too. There’s a reason why she came first for the event at the American Master’s Games – she was the only participant! She earned gold medals in javelin-throw and shot put too. The lady from Chandigarh took to running when she hit 93. She has won more than 20 medals from the Master’s Games conducted all over the world.
Dipa Karmakar
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Image Courtesy: Hindustan Times
She came fourth at the Rio Olympics performing the Produnova vault, in the process becoming only one among five to successfully do it. As she was practising for 2017’s Asian Gymnastic Championship, she suffered a knee injury. Scans told it was an Anterior Cruciate Ligament (ACL) injury, one of the hardest to recover from. After having to sit out and watch many competitions pass by, the Tripura girl went on to clinch gold at FIG Artistic Gymnastics World Challenge Cup in Turkey.
Saba Karim
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Hailing from Durg, Jharkand, and the daughter of a muezzin, Saba started playing hockey in 1994. She first came to the world’s attention as the youngest player participating at the Manchester Commonwealth Games in 2003. Her high point came when she scored six goals, including the winning one in the final of the 2007 Shastri Cup. She was made the captain of India hockey team in 2011. Over a career spanning 13 years, she has played 200 matches and scored 92 goals. The Government of India conferred her with a Padma Shri in 2015.
