Dipa Karmakar Wins India’s 1st Asian Championships Gold

Dipa Karmakar made history by winning India’s first gold medal at the Asian Women’s Artistic Gymnastics Championships on May 26 in Tashkent. She won the women’s vault final with a score of 13.566, beating North Korea’s Kim Son Hyang and Jo Kyong Byol, who won silver and bronze.

Dipa, from Tripura, started gymnastics at six despite having flat feet. She won her first big competition, the Junior Nationals, at 14. She then won multiple gold medals at the 2011 National Games and became the first Indian female gymnast to win a medal at the 2014 Commonwealth Games.

In 2015, Dipa was the first Indian to qualify for the World Championships finals and won a bronze medal at the Asian Championships. At the 2016 Rio Olympics, she finished fourth, just missing a medal.

Dipa faced a major challenge in 2017 with knee surgery, which took her out of competitions for over nine months. Despite this, she received the Padma Shri and was listed among Forbes’ super achievers in Asia under 30. She also received the Arjuna Award and Major Dhyan Chand Khel Ratna Award.

In 2018, Dipa made a strong comeback, winning gold at the FIG Artistic Gymnastics World Challenge Cup in Turkey. She is one of only five women to successfully perform the difficult Produnova vault.

In 2023, Dipa faced a 21-month suspension for a banned substance but returned to competition in July 2023. In January 2024, she won gold at the Artistic Gymnastics National Championship in Odisha. Her recent win at the Asian Championships is also important for Olympic qualifications.

Re-reported from the article originally published in She the People.