Sakshi was never in the Wrestling Federation of India's (WFI) scheme of things. She was living in the shadow of the much-fancied Geeta Phogat and had never figured in any talks of being an Olympic medal probable.
It was early this year that Sakshi Malik checked into her Sports Authority of India (SAI) hostel room in Lucknow. Called to attend the women's Olympic probable camp, this 23-year-old girl from Mokhra village near Rohtak in Haryana was carrying a poster with her, for which she was looking for adhesive to fix it on her wall.
The poster was nothing but a dream, a passion that had imbued every bit of her sleeping and waking moment. And she had made it her mission, a solemn promise to herself to make that dream come true. There were just two words on the poster… "Rio 2016".
Having fixed the poster on one of the walls of her hostel room, Sakshi took out her sketch pen to paint a picture of a 'medal' on one side of the Rio poster.
From that day on, it became routine for Sakshi to kiss that medal as and when she passed through that area. "I was living to see this day," an elated Sakshi revealed about her dream, after ending her medal- starved country's agony.
"Whenever I used to kiss that medal (painted on my Rio poster), I used to get even more determined to reach this moment. And when finally, I qualified for the Rio Games, there was nothing but this medal dominating my mind," Sakshi said after winning India's first medal here at the Olympic Games.
It was not that this young wrestler was not teased by her friends in the camp. "Almost all of my fellow wrestlers used to taunt me about this medal poster. But then, that was just in the lighter vein as everyone there were focused on one goal---to win a medal for India," added the Haryana girl.
Never the first choice
Sakshi was never in the Wrestling Federation of India's (WFI) scheme of things. She was living in the shadow of the much-fancied Geeta Phogat and had never figured in any talks of being an Olympic medal probable.
With her bronze at Rio 2016, Sakshi has become India's fourth woman athlete to have won an Olympic medal. Before her, only Karnam Malleswari (silver in weightlifting, 2000), MC Mary Kom (bronze in Boxing, 2012) and Saina Nehwal (bronze in Badminton, 2012) had won medals for India at the Olympics.
Though Sakshi had an impressive record in the junior circuits, Geeta --- Delhi's 2010 Commonwealth Games gold medallist and the first Indian woman wrestler to qualify for the Olympics in London --- was considered to be the undisputed queen of Indian wrestling.
In Sakshi's own words, before qualifying for Rio, her own aim was till then was also to train with Geeta. Reaching this far and then being able to wear a medal on the Games podium was only a dream, not to be determinedly pursued and fulfilled till a few months back.
It was in April 2016, less than four months to go for the Games, when things changed drastically for Sakshi. In the Olympic qualifying event in Mongolia, Geeta and her sister Babita forfeited their repechage rounds, in their bid to save themselves for the next qualifying tourney in Mongolia, after coming to know that they could not qualify for the Rio.
Neither of them had communicated to the organisers that they would not appear, and their act was considered an 'act of indiscipline', especially since the president of the sport's international body (UWW) had been present in the arena.
This was when both senior wrestlers were suspended by WFI, which was later lifted, but Sakshi, meanwhile, was named to represent India in Istanbul. And that's how her journey to the Rio podium began.
Tough to train
People who know Sakshi or for that matter her other Olympic colleagues --- Vinesh and Babita --- understand how tough it was for their families to fight sexism in a state they were born in.
Haryana has earned the dubious distinction of a place where women have long been treated as second-class citizens and 'honour killings' and sex-selective abortions are rife.
So, it was nothing different for Sakshi or for her other teammates. The sniggering and finger-pointing at her was a daily routine and it was particularly tough during her growing up days when her parents were warned that "with puffed-out ears, it would be difficult to find a husband for her."
Sakshi became a local celebrity after winning silver at the 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow. "It's so weird to see how people can change so suddenly. Now, everyone shows interest in me because I'm rising to the top. But it was never the same when I was starting out," Sakshi once told dna.
Though she is not opposed to marriage but the "game comes first" for this new darling of the wrestling world. "I can only tell people back home in India that given a chance, girls can achieve as much or even more than any of the boys'. We have got to change our thinking, our mindset," Sakshi said while displaying her medal.
Hope, all this will change for good, now!
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 "Sakshi Malik")
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