From refusing modelling offers to winning Khel Ratna: Things you need to know about India Table Tennis star Manika Batra

Indian Table Tennis star Manika Batra was on Wednesday (September 15) left out of the India squad for the Asian Championships beginning September 28 in Doha.

Manika was in news few days after she ade a shocking revelation and had alleged that the national coach Soumyadeep Roy asked her to "concede match" purposely during the Tokyo Olympics qualifiers in March. She added that this was the prominent reason why she refused to take any help from him during her games in the Olympics.

In the absence of Manika Batra, the 97th-ranked Sutirtha Mukherjee will lead the women's team. The other members are Ayhika Mukherjee (ranked 131) and Archana Kamath (132).

Not many know that Manika Batra got plenty of offers to model in her teenage days but she decided to play table tennis and went on to represent India for the first time when she was just 13.

Manika Batra was born in 1995 in Delhi's Naraina Vihar. She has an elder sister Anchal and elder brother Sahil and both are table tennis players. Manika Batra was awarded the Khel Ratna in 2020.

Manika Batra moved to Pune to receive training from coach Sanmay Paranjape. She loves to eat chole bhature remains strong. (Source: Instagram)