Ask any Indian kid who Virat Kohli is, and they will tell you he is India's (possibly the world's) best batsmen. They may even rattle off some of his batting stats or those of Rohit Sharma. Ask them who Mithali Raj is however, that they are likely to be quite blank about this. And yet, the former caption of the women in blue has a new claim to fame; one that outclasses these to players in a sense.
She has had a golden run in the Women's World T20. Her masterful 56 against Pakistan and 51 against Ireland were instrumental in India winning both matches and going on to the semifinals.
She now has the distinction of being India’s highest run getter in the T20 international format. She has scored 2283 runs at an average of 37.42 and strike rate of 96.57.
Mithali Raj is the highest scorer in this format; ahead of Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli.
And just for the record, skipper Harmanpreet Kaur has more runs to her credit than Suresh Raina.
This is a very significant achievement and many cricket lovers were delighted with the achievement.
For a woman to overtake the men is what is still very much a male dominated sport amazed many. But then this can be said for any sport, any sphere of our society.
Whenever the men in blue are playing, Twitter is abuzz with their exploits on and off the field. The women do occasionally find themselves trending briefly though, when they do something really extraordinary; as was the case when the skipper became the first Indian woman to make a T20I century.
Mithali Raj's achievements are huge by any standard. But they do not receive a fraction of the media's attention or the popular adulation that the men do. The women earn a fraction of what the men do. After all how many watch women's cricket? How many channels relay the matches live? Is this simply an extension of our society's patriarchal mindset?
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