Swimming
How swimmer Divya and her para swimmer sister Devanshi are making big waves in India
Among the many young talented swimmers in the country who have shown a lot of promise, comes the name of a pair of sisters from Haryana – Divya and Devanshi Satija.
India has slowly but steadily gained recognition as a force to reckon with in the sport of swimming, especially at the continental level. The emergence of the likes of Virdhawal Khade, Srihari Nataraj and others have held Indian swimming in good stead.
Among the many young talented swimmers in the country who have shown a lot of promise comes the name of a pair of sisters from Haryana – Divya and Devanshi Satija.
Hailing from the city of Faridabad, both the sisters started young and have gone on to clinch quite a few medals for India in the international circuit. While Divya competes in the able-bodied category, Devanshi is a para-swimmer competing in the S10 category.
Practising a sport like swimming professionally in India is not easy, but both Divya and Devanshi kept going with constant support from their family. The younger of the two sisters – Devanshi's first stint with swimming is quite a scary story in itself. She was cheering for her elder sister by the poolside when she accidentally fell into the swimming pool when she was just two years old. While all the people present nearby were sacred for the life of a toddler, Devanshi miraculously made it back to the surface on her own, paddling both her hands and legs!
It was only eight years later when she turned 10, that Devanshi started swimming professionally. Devanshi might be the younger ones, but she has matched Divya medals for medals on the international stage. She is, in fact, the youngest para-swimmer to win a medal at the Asian Para Games – a feat which she achieved when she clinched a bronze and a silver during the 2018 Asian Para Games at Jakarta. Besides, she also has bagged multiple medals at the Youth Asian Games.
Divya, on the other hand, is seen as one of the most talented swimmers in the Indian circuit. A national record holder in the Women's 50m Butterfly, Divya rose to national prominence winning a total of 4 gold medals during the 2019 South Asian Games in Katmandu. The 25-year-old was seen at the top of her art recently at the Uzbekistan Swimming Open 2021 in Tashkent, where she clinched multiple medals for the country.
The Satija sisters have made rapid strides in their short careers. Both Divya and Devanshi are surely the next-gen swimmers the country needs to have their eyes fixed on.
