Women Who Move: 6 Athletes Shaping India's New Sporting Culture

There’s a whole world of Indian sport unfolding beyond names that you might already know. From surfing and skateboarding to motorsport, squash and HYROX, a new generation of women is making some of its most interesting corners their own. Here are the six names worth knowing — and following — now.

Photo credit: Issy Croker

ISHITA MALVIYA

Back in 2007 when surfing wasn't even a category in India yet, Ishita Malviya was already in the water. She sold whatever she could for a board, split even that with a friend for two years, and never looked back. Eventually trading the city life for a fishing village in southern India, Malviya started The Shaka Surf Club — now one of the country's top surf schools. As India's first female surfer, she has paved the way for surfing as a sport in India, especially for women, and remains at home in the ocean, whether in Goa, California or anywhere she can find the next swell.

Follow Ishita Malviya @surfishita

Photo credit: Gopinath Venugopal

MIRA ERDA

Mira Erda was nine years old when she fell for motorsports. At fourteen, she became the youngest female competitor in LGB Formula 4, then came back two years later to win the series' Rookie Championship outright. Three years later, she made history again as the first Indian woman to compete in the Euro JK series, taking the wheel of a BMW FB02 in a field of single-seater racing that had, until then, never included her. An international Formula 4 podium followed. These days, alongside driving, she's a contributing editor at Top Gear Magazine India, and she's stepping into the all-women support series for Formula 1, one lap closer to the F1 dream she's held onto since she first fell in love with the sport.

Follow Mira Erda @mira_erda

ANAHAT SINGH

Anahat Singh started out on the badminton court as a kid, before squash pulled her in for good. By fourteen, she was already representing India at the Commonwealth Games as one of the youngest players in the entire field. It was only the beginning: two bronze medals at the Asian Games as a teenager, a place on India's title-winning squad at the 2025 Squash World Cup, and then, this past July, the biggest win of her junior career — the Women's World Junior Squash Championship, making her the first Indian to take the U19 world singles title. Now she's stepping into the senior ranks, and doing it with real authority: as of this September, she sits around World No. 20, and earlier this month she took down eighth-seeded Nele Gilis at the London Classic — her biggest PSA win yet.

Follow Anahat Singh @anahatsingh13

Image courtesy: Lara Kaur

ATITA VERGHESE

Atita Verghese discovered skateboarding back when the sport barely existed in India — and she didn't just take it up, she built the whole ecosystem around it for the women who'd come after her. Now widely regarded as the pioneer of women's skateboarding in India, the Bangalore-born, Vans-sponsored skater is the founder of Girl Skate India: running free workshops and all-women skate tours, and building more than ten skateparks across the country. She's picked up a few cultural moments along the way, too, with a feature in Red Bull Skate Tales, a cameo in the Netflix film Skater Girl, and work as both a skate instructor and stunt performer.

Follow Atita Verghese @rattyatty

TISHYA SAGAR

Tishya Sagar started playing padel in Bali, which has since become something of a sporting second home for her. She's now ranked the number six padel player in India, and the sport has taken her everywhere from Spain and Dubai to Sri Lanka and Portugal; these days, her holidays are essentially what she calls "sports holidays". But padel is only part of the picture. She plays five or six times a week, keeps up a steady rhythm of strength and hybrid training sessions, and has become a regular on the Hyrox circuit, competing across Mumbai, Delhi, and Bengaluru, and as far afield as Heerenveen in the Netherlands. In Mumbai, she clocked an individual time of 1:21:28 last year, good for fourth in her 25–29 age group. In Delhi the same year, she podiumed at number two among women, and in Bengaluru this year, she and doubles partner Sahirah Oshidar placed sixth overall in women's doubles.

Follow Tishya Sagar @tishyasagar

SANJANA GEORGE

Sanjana George is a Kerala-born athlete with a background in MMA, obstacle-course racing, functional fitness, WWE and, currently, HYROX. She started out in martial arts because she wanted to be capable of defending herself and her sisters. That instinct carried her to WWE's 2019 India tryout, where she was listed as an obstacle-course racer and MMA fighter with a 5–1 fight record. Her biggest breakthrough came in 2021, when she was recruited to the WWE Performance Center in Orlando — the only woman among that particular group of four Indian recruits, and with no previous professional-wrestling experience to speak of.

These days, it's HYROX that has her full attention. She finished second in HYROX Delhi 2025 Women and third overall in HYROX Bengaluru 2026 Pro Women, and in Bengaluru, she also set the Indian national record in Pro Women, at 1:25:49. At HYROX Mumbai 2026, she'll take on Pro Doubles Women alongside Tishya Sagar — the two are already teammates on the women's relay, so Mumbai will be a natural extension of a partnership that's already working.

Follow Sanjana George @sanjanageorge