ALIFA congratulates the historic victory of Indian women in Cricket: Salutes Young Women’s Leadership in Sport: Beyond the Boundary, Against the Odds
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Young Women’s Leadership in Sport: Beyond the Boundary, Against the Odds
ALIFA congratulates the historic victory of Indian women in Cricket!
5th Nov, 2025: All India Feminist Alliance (ALIFA-NAPM), a pan-India collective of feminist, grassroots organizations and individuals heartily congratulates the Indian Women’s Cricket Team that has firmly placed India once again on the global sporting map. Winning the World Cup is not only a historic moment for Indian sport, it is a collective reminder of what can happen when young women lead with integrity, courage, and care. We believe that the team’s victory belongs to every girl, every young woman, who has been told that the field is not her place, that leadership belongs to someone else, that she must shrink to be accepted. It is also a win for all those trailblazers who came before and forged a place for Indian women on the field.
The Indian Women’s team did not win only the World Cup, but as the cliché goes, they won the hearts of all who witnessed them play. This is so for a reason. The influence of big money, highly specialized coaching/fitness regimens and individual stardom have led to the world of professional sports becoming exceptionally corporatized. Under such conditions, the celebration of extraordinary feats on the field turns into adulation of stars alone. The Indian Women’s cricket team broke with this banality of spectacle. We witnessed the talent, hard work and determination of our sportswomen as they made history, and we also witnessed the all-too-human rawness of emotion, overwhelming exhaustion and cathartic joy.
This is partly why Harman, Smriti, ‘Jemi’, Deepti, Shafali, Richa and other team members have become household names. After a campaign brimming with stellar individual performances, when asked to sum up what got them their win, vice-captain Smriti Mandhana echoed semi-final hero Jemimah Rodrigues when she spoke about the spirit of care and togetherness in the team. ‘The super strength of this team that nobody will talk about is getting stuck in and playing for each other. We needed each other’s support’. The two champions were talking about something different that was palpable to viewers. At a time when sports is often compared to war, there was joy and camaraderie on display. Our players displayed feminist leadership that uplifts others, that holds steady under pressure, that does not need to imitate patriarchal power to be legitimate.
The journey of these women speaks to much more than a successful World Cup campaign. It reflects what it means to lead as young women in India today, navigating the heavy expectations of public scrutiny, mental health struggles, and even religious targeting. It builds on and illuminates the journeys of past players, who toiled without recognition for decades. With this win, the world has rediscovered not only Mithali Raj and Anjum Chopra but also Jhulan Goswami, Neetu David and Nooshin Al Khadeer from a previous generation. A long history of silence has greeted women’s achievements on the field in India. The tradition goes back to 1973 when Diana Edulji, Shantha Rangaswamy and others formed India’s first women’s cricket team with little to no institutional support. Today’s champions are bearers of a legacy of resilience against all odds, rooted in self-belief. No wonder they turned things around even after three consecutive defeats!
While it is important that their achievement be echoed and celebrated, it is also necessary to draw attention to the unequal, gendered and heavily corporatized nature of the sports ‘industry’. Women’s cricket in India traces its beginnings to 1973 and it is only now that it is beginning to get recognition.
Sport has never been neutral. Who gets to play, who is cheered for, who is funded, and whose talent is doubted, all mirror existing hierarchies. For generations, sportswomen in India have had to fight for playgrounds, uniforms, sponsors, and basic recognition. They have trained at dawn on uneven fields, balanced unpaid care work with training schedules, and faced moral policing, abuse and even death for daring to dream.
We can’t forget young Radhika Yadav, rising tennis player of Haryana, who was shot dead by her own father earlier this year. Nor can we forget the brave women wrestlers who exposed and challenged powerful sexual predators who continue to enjoy institutional impunity. And yet, each time women step onto the field, they make it a little more possible for others to follow. Each time a young woman bowls, bats, kicks a ball, captains, or coaches, her presence is an act of creation, building new possibilities rather than simply resisting exclusion.
A New Language of Leadership:
In India, the field is not only gendered, but also layered with caste, class and faith. This was on display as fundamentalist bigots trolled our semi-final hero Jemimah Rodrigues because of her religious identity. Her achievement, conduct and leadership carries weight in a time when visibility itself is political. She plays in a country where a woman can be simultaneously praised as a national hero and vilified online by right-wing or patriarchal trolls.
Jemimah’s calm in the face of such contradictions is the strength of a woman who knows her worth beyond the noise. In her moment of glory, she chose to highlight the support she received from others. She spoke about her mental health challenges with honesty, carried the pressures of representation with dignity, even while facing religious hostility and gendered hate. Her leadership tells a story larger than cricket. It shows what it means for a young woman from a minority faith to shine in the public arena, not as a symbol of exception but as part of a continuum of women transforming what leadership in India means. Jemimah truly deserves a rousing ovation from every Indian not only for her exemplary sporting capacities but also for being the person she is.
What unfolded on the field on 30th October and 2nd November at the DY Patil Stadium in Navi Mumbai were not just sporting milestones. We were witness to a new vocabulary of leadership; one shaped by collaboration, empathy, and integrity. The leadership we witnessed from Jemimah, team captain Harmanpreet Kaur and vice-captain Smriti Mandhana resembles the leadership of young feminists across India who are reimagining what responsible wielding of power can look like: accountable, non-discriminatory and deeply human. We have witnessed how feminist solidarities can transform sporting spaces.
This moment indeed belongs to every young woman who has defied expectation, who has picked up a bat, a mic, a protest placard, or a notebook despite being told that public space is not hers. It belongs to the women who carved the path: the coaches, mothers, organisers, and teammates who believed in a different kind of future. It equally belongs to the young girls and women watching from the margins, those who were not allowed to play, and those who face hostility for their faith or caste. For them, seeing women lead on the field is a reminder that their dreams are valid.
Future Feminist Fields:
While we celebrate this win, we also recognise the work ahead. Women athletes in India continue to face gender pay gaps, under-representation in coaching and governance, lack of safe infrastructure, and persistent harassment and online abuse. Women athletes from religious minorities as well as from Dalit, Adivasi, queer, and trans backgrounds experience multiple and intersecting forms of discrimination, often unseen or unacknowledged. To truly honour this moment, we must demand a sporting ecosystem that funds women’s leagues equitably, ensures safety, dignity, non-discrimination on and off the field, values mental well-being, and listens to women athletes as experts in shaping policy. We should also work towards a sports culture that isn’t celebrity-centric and heavily dependent on corporate funding.
UN frameworks have long recognised sport as a driver of gender equality, a space where women and girls can build confidence, leadership, and solidarity. India’s women athletes are living proof of that vision. This potential can be realised when women are not just participants but decision-makers, when they lead teams, federations, media, and policy. This is a moment to recognise women’s leadership as essential to India’s social and political fabric. When women lead, they do not simply ‘fill gaps’; they reimagine the whole. They show that leadership can be ethical, visionary, and strong without being violent.
We celebrate the Indian Women’s Cricket Team and every young woman who carries this legacy forward. Their leadership is teaching the country something fundamental: that equity is not a distant aspiration but a practice that must play out in every field, every day. We celebrate, we commit, and we continue until every girl can play, lead, and thrive without permission, prejudice, or fear. Every time a woman steps onto the field, she expands what is possible for all of us.
Zindabad to the Indian Women’s Cricket Team!
Zindabad to Every Indian Woman who Dares to Dream!
Endorsed by Members of All India Feminist Alliance (ALIFA - NAPM)
1. Bhanu Kalluri, Feminist Researcher and Activist, Telangana
2. Arundhati Ghosh, Independent Consultant, Bengaluru
3. Dr. Sanju, ALIFA, Churu, Rajasthan
4. Sharanya, Solidarity worker, Koraput, Odisha
5. Laxmi Murthy, journalist and researcher, Bengaluru
6. Chayanika Shah, Hasrat-e-Zindagi Mamuli, Mumbai
7. Adv Dr Shalu Nigam, Delhi NCR
8. Moumita Alam, Poet and essayist
9. Mallu Kumbar, Gender-sexual minorities and social activist, Karnataka
10. Bhuvana Balaji, Independent Researcher, Bengaluru
11. Albertina Almeida, Human Rights Lawyer, Goa
12. Gouthami, Feminist Researcher and Trainer, Goa
13. Sagari R Ramdas, Food Sovereignty Alliance, Hyderabad
14. Suneetha, ALIFA, Telangana, Hyderabad.
15. Deepthi, ALIFA, Telangana, Hyderabad.
16. Neetisha Xalxo, Feminist Academic and Activist, Jharkhand
17. Dr Preeti Edakunny, Feminist Academic, Bengaluru
18. Plaksha Srivastava, Student of Gender Studies, Delhi
19. Nisha Gulur, Gender-sexual minorities and human rights activist, Karnataka
20. Raynah Marise, Indian Christian Women's Movement, Pune
21. Radhika Desai, Independent Researcher, Goa
22. Hasina Khan, Beebak Collective, Mumbai
23. Gabriele Dietrich, Penn Urimay Iyakkam & NAPM, Tamil Nadu
24. Meera Sanghamitra, ALIFA and NAPM Telangana
Issued by: All India Feminist Alliance (ALIFA - NAPM)
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