Make up for Vinesh Phogat’s deprived medal at Olympics, winning 5 gold medals, one silver and two bronze, with one fifth-place finish
Relegate powerhouse Japan to the second position, with Kazakhstan finishing third
Men’s freestyle team returns empty-handed
Indian wrestlers may have had just a bronze metal to show in the recently concluded Paris Olympics, but young women wrestlers have shined brighter than diamonds by winning the first-ever women’s freestyle wrestling team title in the Under-17 World Wrestling Championships held in Jordan’s capital Amman.
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According to information available on the website of the world wrestling governing body, United World Wrestling (UWW), India finished the women’s competition in the under-17 worlds with five gold medals, one silver, two bronze and a fifth-place finish to win the title with overall 185 points.
Powerhouse Japan finished second with 146 points and Kazakhstan took the third spot with 79 points.
The championships were conducted in the Princess Sumaya Bint al-Hasan Arena in Amman from August 19-25.
The meet features competitions in all three wrestling disciplines – men’s freestyle, Greco-Roman and women’s freestyle. Each discipline offers medals in 10 different weight categories, with four medals (one gold, one silver and two bronze) awarded per weight category.
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Indian wrestlers competed in 29 of the 30 medal events – 10 in Greco-Roman, 10 in men’s freestyle and nine in women’s freestyle.
The men’s freestyle team returned empty-handed, though in Greco-Roman discipline, India additionally won two bronze medals.
At the U17 World Wrestling Championships in Istanbul last year, India had overall bagged one gold, seven silver and three bronze medals in all three dsiciplines.
(Greco-Roman wrestling is a style of wrestling practiced in Olympics and international amateur competitions, in which legs are forbidden to be used in any way to obtain a fall, and no holds are allowed to be taken below the waist. Other rules and procedures for Greco-Roman wrestling are the same as those for freestyle wrestling, the other international amateur style)
| Indian medallists | ||
| Indian wrestler | Event | Medal |
| Aditi Kumari | Women’s freestyle 43kg | Gold |
| Neha Sangwan | Women’s freestyle 57kg | Gold |
| Pulkit | Women’s freestyle 65kg | Gold |
| Kajal | Women’s freestyle 69kg | Gold |
| Mansi Lather | Women’s freestyle 73kg | Gold |
| Shrutika Patil | Women’s freestyle 46kg | Silver |
| Bala Raj | Women’s freestyle 40kg | Bronze |
| Muskan | Women’s freestyle 53kg | Bronze |
| Sainath Pardhi | Greco-Roman 51kg | Bronze |
| Ronak Dahiya | Greco-Roman 110kg | Bronze |
Young Indian women wrestlers had been flirting with the pinnacle of glory, top of the podium in Women’s Wrestling at the U17 World Championships, consistently finishing in the top five since 2016. They came particularly close to winning the title in 2021 in the absence of Japan. But the United States had then sealed the title with the final bout of the competition.
India’s impressive victory capped a run of successes by the U17 women wrestling team, claiming the U17 Asian Championships crown over China and Japan. Last year, it had won its first U20 World Championships team title as well, incidentally, that too in Amman.
Team left stranded at airport
The glorious moments of the young women’s team were, however, dampened somewhat when at the conclusion of the championships, the nine Indian women wrestlers and their three coaches were left stranded at the Queen Alia International Airport in Amman when they missed their respective flights back home, scheduled for Saturday evening.
Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) body, which is under suspension since December 2023 by the Union sports ministry for not conforming to the National Sports Code, is learnt to have made arrangement for their overnight stay and return home by the next flight available.
In suspending the WFI body, immediately after holding of its fresh elections, the ministry had argued that the newly elected WFI body was working under the complete control of its former office-bearers, which was not in conformity with the National Sports Code.
