Bhavina Patel

BHAVINA PATEL WINS  SILVER IN TABLE TENNIS

Table Tennis player BHAVINA PATEL win a first Indian historical Paralympics silver medal.

Patel was diagnosed with polio when she was 12 month old, she lost mobility below her waist. At the age of 12, She moved to Blind People's Association in Vastrapur, Ahmedabad to learn computers. It was here that she came across impaired children playing Table Tennis and spontaneously decided to take up the sport.

Bhavina then began to learn Table Tennis and got off the blocks quickly. She started playing professionally in college in Ahmedabad. She won her first medal in 2011 as she won a silver at the para Table Tennis Thailand Open.

Before the Paralympics and with the pandemic peaking in Europe, the two were together in spain for a tournament that was vital Bhavina's qualification for Tokyo. Having missed the Rio Paralympics by a whisker because of lack of points, the two had decided that they couldn't take any changes. Both sat and planned their schedule perfectly.

"So for six months during the pandemic, Bhavina trained at home. After a point, we would ask the coach and other wheelchair players to come home and play against her," he says. With one-forth of the Patel household occupied by TT, there are constraints. "When we have guests at home, we fold the table and sleep on the floor. Ours is not a very big house but TT has been allocated enough space."

"This is what a medal does. Before that, even if a Paralympic was living two houses away you wouldn't be aware. But our Subh Laabh Society is different. They all came to say goodbye to her and wish her luck." As he speak, the telephone picks up again. The fame of India's First ever Table Tennis Paralympics medallist has gone beyond the two houses.

Over the year, Bhavina participated in multiple tournaments and won as many as 5 Gold medals, 13 Silver medals for India.