Manika Batra

Manika Batra (born 15 June 1995) is an Indian table tennis player. As of November 2020, she is the top-ranked female table tennis player in India and ranked 63rd in the world.[2] She specialises in playing long-pimples on her backhand, a rubber which is not often played by top players.[3] She received Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna award in 2020.[4]

Manika Batra
Personal information
Full nameManika Batra
NationalityIndian
Born (1995-06-15) 15 June 1995[1]
Delhi, India[1]
Playing styleShakehand grip
Height1.8 m (5 ft 11 in) (2018)[1]
Weight67 kg (148 lb) (2018)[1]

Early life

Batra was born on 15 June 1995 as the youngest of three children.[5] She hails from Naraina Vihar in Delhi[6] and began playing table tennis at the age of four.[7] Her elder sister Anchal and elder brother Sahil both played table tennis,[8] with Anchal having an influence on her during her early playing career.[9] After winning a match in a state-level under-8 tournament, Batra decided to train under coach Sandeep Gupta who suggested her to switch to Hans Raj Model School where he ran his academy.[8]

Batra turned down many modelling offers as a teenager.[1] When she was 16, she declined a scholarship to train at the Peter Karlsson Academy in Sweden.[10] She studied at the Jesus and Mary College for a year before dropping out to "concentrate" on table tennis.[11]

Career

Manika Batra in action at 2019 Commonwealth Table Tennis Championships, Odisha, India

In 2011, Batra won the silver medal in the under-21 category of the Chile Open.[7] She represented India at the 2014 Commonwealth Games at Glasgow, where she finished quarterfinalist,[8] as well as the 2014 Asian Games. She won three medals at the 2015 Commonwealth Table Tennis Championships,[9] winning silver in the women's team event (with Ankita Das and Mouma Das) as well as the women's doubles event (with Ankita Das) and bronze in the women's singles event.[12]

Batra won three gold medals at the 2016 South Asian Games,[13] winning the women's doubles event (with Pooja Sahasrabudhe), mixed doubles event (with Anthony Amalraj) and women's team event (with Mouma Das and Shamini Kumaresan). Batra was denied a fourth gold medal at the Games by Mouma Das, who defeated her in the final of the women's singles event.[14] She qualified for the women's singles event of the 2016 Summer Olympics by winning the South Asia group of the qualification tournament in April 2016.[15] However, her appearance at the 2016 Olympics short-lived, as she lost to Katarzyna Grzybowska of Poland in the first round of the women's individual event.[16]

Batra led the Indian women's team to a gold medal win in the final against four-time gold medalists and defending champions Singapore at the 2018 Commonwealth Games in Gold Coast, Australia.[17] The Singapore women's table tennis team had never lost in the Commonwealth Games since the sport was inducted in the program in 2002. Batra defeated world number 4 Feng Tianwei as well as Zhou Yihan in India's 3–1 win in the final.[18]

Batra and Mouma Das won India's maiden silver medal in the women's doubles category at the 2018 Commonwealth Games losing to defending champions Feng Tianwei and Yu Mengyu of Singapore in the gold medal clash. Batra became the first Indian woman to bag a commonwealth table tennis individual gold medal in CWG 2018 by beating Yu Mengyu of Singapore. She won 4 medals in 4 events she was participating out of which 2 are gold, 1 silver and 1 bronze medal.[19]

On 12 December 2018 she became the only Indian to receive "The Breakthrough Star Award" by ITTF.

In 2020, she failed to secure for India a position in the Women's Team event at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics when she lost in the opening match of the Tokyo 2020 Qualifiers quarter-final to France's Marie Migot 2-3.[20]

In the media

Batra was featured on the cover of the July 2018 issue of Femina.[21]

She also featured in the November 2018 edition of Vogue Magazine.

References

  1. "Manika Batra". Glasgow 2014. Retrieved 28 June 2016.
  2. "ITTF - World Ranking". ranking.ittf.com. Retrieved 1 December 2020.
  3. "Manika's sleight of backhand gives India historic gold". ESPN. 8 April 2018. Retrieved 24 August 2020.
  4. "'It motivates me to work harder': Manika Batra on winning Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna". DNA India. 29 August 2020. Retrieved 18 October 2020.
  5. Judge, Shahid (3 July 2016). "India's table tennis hope for Rio 2016 Olympics – Manika Batra". The Indian Express. Retrieved 6 July 2016.
  6. "Paddler Manika Batra completes hat-trick of gold medals at South Asian Games". News18. 10 February 2016. Retrieved 4 July 2016.
  7. "Manika Batra: the new hope of the nation". The Hindu. 21 August 2011. Retrieved 28 June 2016.
  8. Sen, Debayan (27 July 2016). "Manika Batra looks to Rio and beyond". ESPN.in. Retrieved 2 August 2016.
  9. Ghoshal, Shuvro (11 February 2016). "Interview with Manika Batra: "I don't want to go to Rio Olympics and return without a medal"". Yahoo!. Archived from the original on 22 August 2016. Retrieved 4 July 2016.
  10. Judge, Shahid (18 December 2015). "Improved fitness key to Manika Batra's consistency". The Indian Express. Retrieved 28 June 2016.
  11. Patra, Pratyush (6 May 2016). "Delhi love & Rio talk before Olympics". The Times of India. Retrieved 6 July 2016.
  12. Keerthivasan, K. (21 December 2015). "Singapore sweeps singles titles". The Hindu. Retrieved 6 July 2016.
  13. "Rio Zone – Manika Batra: Nation's new hope". Pune Mirror. 1 June 2016. Retrieved 28 June 2016.
  14. "South Asian Games: India clean sweeps 12 medals in Table Tennis". Ten Sports. 10 February 2016. Retrieved 6 July 2016.
  15. "Table Tennis: Soumyajit Ghosh, Manika Batra book Rio Olympics berths with victories in Asian Qualifiers". DNA India. 14 April 2016. Retrieved 28 June 2016.
  16. "Rio Olympics 2016: Mouma Das, Manika Batra lose as Indian women's challenge in table tennis ends". First Post. 6 August 2016. Retrieved 8 August 2016.
  17. "Manika Batra leads India to historic women Table Tennis gold at Commonwealth Games". The Economic Times. 8 April 2018. Retrieved 8 April 2018.
  18. "CWG 2018: India women win gold in table tennis team event". Commonwealth Games News. Times of India. 8 April 2018.
  19. "Manika Batra wins bronze in the mixed doubles to win her fourth medal". 14 April 2018. Retrieved 15 April 2018.
  20. PTI (25 January 2020). "Tokyo 2020: France defeat ends Indian women's Table Tennis team's Olympic dream". India Today. Retrieved 2 March 2020.
  21. "India's golden girls glam up Femina's latest cover". Rediff. Retrieved 17 July 2018.
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