Sporting icons exhibit never say die spirit

As the Women’s World Cup victory sinks in, a trio of sporting icons from Punjab has reminded the world of the state’s unyielding spirit, which has been otherwise plagued by adversities like drugs, gangsterism, migration and corruption.

Harmanpreet Kaur, Shubman Gill and Harmanpreet Singh — three champions hailing from the land of five rivers — have not just etched their names in the annals of sports but risen as beacons of hope for the state that gets more bad press.

Punjab gets more headlines from the scourge of drug smuggling along its borders, the heart-wrenching farmer agitations that gripped the nation in recent years, choking haze of stubble burning that allegedly blankets Delhi every winter and echoes of terrorism that still linger in collective memory. Add to it the menace of gangsterism, with Punjabi gangsters making headlines in foreign countries, besides the mad rush to search for greener pastures abroad.

Born in Moga, Harmanpreet Kaur as captain of the Indian women’s team, embodies the fiery determination that Punjabis are known for — the same resolve that fuels late-night harvest vigils or protests for justice. On November 2, Kaur scripted history by leading India to its maiden ICC Women’s World Cup title, a victory that healed the scars of the heartbreaking loss in 2017, the previous final.

“We have now broken the barrier; winning has to be a habit now,” declared Kaur post-match. Her journey — from a small-town girl batting with a taped-up bat to a global icon — mirrors Punjab’s own fight against odds.

Indian men’s cricket team Captain Shubman Gill has emerged from gangland shadows to cricket’s golden boy. Fazilka, a dusty border district just 11 km from Pakistan, is a land where gang wars once ruled the night with rival factions clashing over land, honour and smuggling routes. This was the Fazilka that Shubman Gill was born into in 1999, a town still scarred by militancy’s aftermath. Yet, in the midst of this volatile frontier, a young boy chose a cricket bat over a bullet.

His father, Lakhwinder Singh converted a patch of their farmland into a makeshift cricket ground - complete with a cement pitch poured under floodlights powered by a tractor generator.

From Fazilka’s gang-riddled lanes to captaining India in England in 2025, Gill’s journey is Punjab’s redemption arc in human form.

Indian hockey Captain Harmanpreet Singh with his thunderous drag-flicks, has revitalised a sport close to Punjab’s soul — hockey, the game of warriors from the villages that once produced Olympic legends. As captain of the Indian men’s team, Singh’s penalty corner prowess has made him the highest goal-scorer in modern Indian hockey history, a feat capped by the bronze medal at the 2024 Paris Olympics.