Like many other fields, sports is a field where women are severely under-represented. The reasons for that range from societal prejudices to lack of any real opportunity. However, on the positive side, there has been an increase in organisations promoting women’s participation in sports, and I’m proud to inform that Assist—one of my initiatives—is one such organisation.
Between March 25 and 29, Assist hosted Crossover India’s ‘Hoops Creating Hope’ (HCH) basketball camp for the differently-abled children of Amar Jyoti Charitable Trust, Delhi and the less privileged children of Teach For India. Although HCH is an annual event which is the same wild success every year, this year’s rendition is distinctly memorable as it is the first time ever that the event has taken place in Delhi. Also, I was glad to see that 70 percent of the total participants were girls—breaking the sports-related gender stereotype.
The enthusiasm with which the girls participated in the camp clearly matched, if not bettered, the performance of the boys. In a group of over 140 students, the sportiest commotion was caused by the female ballers as they learnt the tricks and skills from women’s basketball icon, and current WNBA Defender Of The Year, Alana Beard and Crossover’s own Shaun Jayachandran and Carie Small. The event was smoothly conducted, thanks to the dedication and hard work of our 20+ student volunteers and Teach For India’s event management team.
I hope that the exposure Assist brought to women’s basketball through this 5-day long camp will encourage their greater participation in other sports and even fields as well.
Blog of Kartikeya Goel 