When shy, reserved Girija first joined the Kabaddi team formed by her community’s mahila mandal (women’s group), she was engaged in a legal battle with a brother who threatened to throw herself and her parents out of their home.

 

Serving at first as a means of escape from her stressful home situation, Girija hardly expected that sports would soon be causing her to travel regularly to new cities and villages, meet other female athletes, and fiercely battle her way to victory in a final match attended by thousands.

 

“Until I started playing on the Kabaddi team, nobody in the village knew who I was,” reports Girija Devi. “Now I’m a common face. I have grown so much through Kabaddi. It has given me a new identity. Now I am a confident, strong woman: not a victim.”