Para-badminton star Manasi Joshi takes indirect dig at India’s Border-Gavaskar Trophy woes: ‘Cricket ka thoda funding…’
Para-badminton star Manasi Joshi reacted to India's poor form in Australia, and had a special request for the government.
With cricket remaining as the main sporting attraction in India, other sports like chess, badminton, football, shooting, athletics are also rising up in the popularity scale. India have also been putting in better performances in Paralympic sports. At the 2024 Paralympics in France, India bagged seven gold medals, nine silver and 13 bronze.

India sent a contingent of 84 athletes, competing across 12 sports in the 2024 Paralympics. During the opening ceremony, Bhagyashree Jadhav, Sumit Antil were the Indian flag bearers. In the closing, Preethi Pal and Harvinder Singh were the flag bearers. India’s 29 medals was also their highest-ever medal tally in the Paralympic Games, overtaking the 19 medals clinched in Tokyo 2020.
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Manasi Joshi trolls Team India
Taking to X, formerly known as Twitter, Indian para-badminton player Manasi Joshi publicly requested the Indian government to invest more on para sports, and promised better results in return. She wrote, “Cricket ka thoda funding para sports mein daalo plz. Hum better results dete hai.”
Manasi’s post also comes after India’s poor performances in the ongoing 2024 Border-Gavaskar Trophy, where they are trailing 1-2 vs Australia. Day 1 of the final Test match on Friday saw India’s batting struggles continue as they folded for 185. In response, the hosts reached 9/1 at Stumps in the first innings. The final Test match has also seen regular captain Rohit Sharma rested, with Jasprit Bumrah performing as standby skipper. Bumrah has been India’s solitary performer in the ongoing series, with other players putting in highly erratic displays.
Manasi is a former world champion in the women’s singles SL3 category. She is currently ranked seventh in the SL3 category, and is second in the SL3-SU5 section. She is also 13th in the XD SL3-SU5 category.
She has also been recognised by BBC as one of the 100 most inspirational and powerful women across the world in 2020, and was also nominated for the BBC Indian Sportswoman of the Year Award of 2020.
