It is merely in recent years that women in the subcontinent have been acknowledged as professional cricket players. Over many years, they faced ridicule, censure, exclusion – including the threat of physical harm – to follow their passion. Now, India is staging a global tournament with a total purse of $13.8 million, where the host country's players could become national treasures if they secure their maiden championship win.
This would, then, be a great injustice if this weekend's talk centered around their male counterparts. And yet, when India face Pakistan on Sunday, comparison are inevitable. And not because the host team are highly favoured to win, but because they are not expected to exchange greetings with their rivals. Handshakegate, if we must call it that, will have a fourth instalment.
In case you weren't aware of the original drama, it took place at the conclusion of the male team's group stage game between India and Pakistan at the continental championship last month when the India captain, Suryakumar Yadav, and his squad hurried off the field to evade the usual post-game post-match ritual. A couple of similar sequels transpired in the Super4 match and the championship game, culminating in a long-delayed award ceremony where the title winners refused to accept the cup from the Pakistan Cricket Board's chair, Mohsin Naqvi. It would have been humorous if it hadn't been so distressing.
Observers of the women's World Cup might well have hoped for, and even imagined, a alternative conduct on Sunday. Female athletics is supposed to offer a new blueprint for the industry and an alternative to toxic legacies. The sight of Harmanpreet Kaur's team members extending the fingers of friendship to Fatima Sana and her team would have sent a strong message in an ever more polarized world.
It might have recognized the mutually adverse circumstances they have conquered and offered a symbolic reminder that political issues are fleeting compared with the connection of female solidarity. It would certainly have deserved a spot alongside the additional good news story at this tournament: the exiled Afghanistan players welcomed as guests, being brought back into the game four years after the Taliban forced them to flee their homes.
Rather, we've collided with the hard limits of the female athletic community. This comes as no surprise. India's men's players are mega celebrities in their country, worshipped like gods, treated like royalty. They possess all the benefits and power that accompanies fame and wealth. If Yadav and his side are unable to defy the directives of an strong-handed prime minister, what chance do the female players have, whose elevated status is only newly won?
Maybe it's even more surprising that we're still talking about a handshake. The Asia Cup uproar prompted much analysis of that particular sporting ritual, especially because it is viewed as the definitive symbol of fair play. But Yadav's refusal was much less important than what he stated immediately after the initial match.
The India captain considered the victory stand the "ideal moment" to dedicate his team's victory to the military personnel who had taken part in India's attacks on Pakistan in May, known as Operation Sindoor. "My wish is they continue to inspire us all," Yadav told the post-match interviewer, "so we can provide them more reasons in the field each time we get an opportunity to bring them joy."
This is where we are: a live interview by a sporting leader openly celebrating a armed attack in which many people lost their lives. Previously, Australian cricketer Usman Khawaja couldn't get a solitary humanitarian message approved by the ICC, not even the peace dove – a literal sign of harmony – on his bat. Yadav was eventually fined 30% of his match fee for the remarks. He was not the sole individual sanctioned. Pakistan's Haris Rauf, who mimicked aircraft crashing and made "six-zero" signals to the audience in the later game – also referencing the hostilities – received the identical penalty.
This isn't a matter of not respecting your opponents – this is athletics co-opted as patriotic messaging. There's no use to be ethically angered by a missing handshake when that's merely a small detail in the story of two countries already employing cricket as a diplomatic tool and weapon of indirect conflict. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi clearly stated this with his post-final tweet ("Operation Sindoor on the games field. The result remains unchanged – India wins!"). Naqvi, on his side, blares that sport and politics must remain separate, while holding dual roles as a government minister and chair of the PCB, and publicly tagging the Indian leader about his country's "embarrassing losses" on the battlefield.
The takeaway from this episode is not about the sport, or the Indian side, or Pakistan, in isolation. It's a warning that the notion of sports diplomacy is finished, at least for now. The very game that was used to foster connections between the nations 20 years ago is now being used to heighten hostilities between them by individuals who are fully aware what they're doing, and massive followings who are active supporters.
Division is infecting every realm of society and as the greatest of the global soft powers, sport is constantly susceptible: it's a form of entertainment that literally encourages you to choose a team. Many who find India's gesture towards Pakistan belligerent will nonetheless champion a Ukrainian tennis player's entitlement to decline meeting a Russian competitor across the net.
If you're still kidding yourself that the sporting arena is a protected environment that unites countries, review the Ryder Cup highlights. The behavior of the New York spectators was the "ideal reflection" of a golf-loving president who publicly provokes animosity against his adversaries. We observed not just the decline of the typical sporting values of equity and mutual respect, but the speed at which this might be normalized and nodded through when athletes – such as US captain Keegan Bradley – fail to acknowledge and penalize it.
A post-game greeting is supposed to represent that, at the conclusion of any contest, however bitter or bad-tempered, the participants are putting off their simulated rivalry and acknowledging their shared human bond. If the enmity is genuine – demanding that its players emerge in vocal support of their respective militaries – then why are you bothering with the arena of sports at all? You might as well don the fatigues immediately.
