BENGALURU: Emotions ran high when Hina Banu got the news of her maiden call-up to the Indian senior women’s hockey team on Monday.Hannah’s first instinct was to call her mother. She broke down inconsolably—not just with joy, but with memories of all her daughter had endured to get here. For the 22-year-old midfielder from Lucknow, the Indian senior team jersey is proof that perseverance can overcome fear, resistance and even violence. A recent study of women’s participation and viewership in sports by the BBC and Collective Newsroom shows that women’s participation in UP has increased from 1% to 10% in the last five years. Behind this rise are the stories of women who fought social and personal battles simply to continue playing the game.Hina’s story is one of them. She lost her father when she was two years old and was raised by her paternal grandfather Ajgar Ali, an army barber, and her uncle. Sports were never seen as a viable avenue for girls. “My grandfather and uncle were against me playing hockey because they were worried about what the society would say if I went to the hostel,” Hanna said.Hina started playing hockey in 2014 after her coach Abhishek encouraged her to switch to sports from athletics. “Once I started hockey, I couldn’t stay away from it,” she said.Resistance at home intensified. “He beat me when I refused to play. I cried many times, not because of the pain, but because the thought of not playing hockey anymore scared me.”The pressure forced him to resign for nearly three years. Still, the game kept pulling him back. In 2017, he secretly attended trials at the SAI center in Lucknow. His school principal and coach went to his house to convince the family to let him pursue the sport. “It took a lot of convincing,” he said.
