Arati Janoba Patil (22), a native of Nandgad village in Khanapur taluk, has been selected for the BWF Thailand Para-Badminton International-2019 to be held from September 14 to 21 at Bangkok and the BWF China Para-Badminton International-2019 to be held from September 24 to 29 at Hangzhou in China.
Since these events are open tournaments and are not sponsored by the Badminton Federation, Arati has to bear all the expenditure herself. Arati, who needed Rs 3 lakh for the travel and stay, arranged Rs 2 lakh. However, this young badminton player is still in need of Rs 1 lakh. Her family is facing great hardship to arrange this money.
Arati, who is presently staying at Uchgaon village in Kolhapur district, is a specially-abled girl who has only one hand since birth. Without letting this deter her, she has won several prizes; among them are a silver medal in the Asian youth para games that was held in Dubai in 2017, a bronze medal in the Victor-Denmark para-badminton held in Denmark in 2018 and a bronze again in the Uganda Para badminton International held in Uganda in April 2019.
With her achievement, Arati is now ranked as the number 2 para-badminton player in the women's single standing upper category, 9th in the Tokyo-2020 para-Olympics and 20th in the world.
Born in a poor family at Nandgad village, Arati was brought up at her uncle's house. Her birthplace is Sagare, a hamlet situated in the thick forests in Khanapur taluk. As it was difficult to survive in Khanapur, her father Janoba, a mason, shifted to Kolhapur in search of work and settled there.
Speaking to Express, Arati said, "The support and encouragement of my family and coaches has helped me to reach this level in badminton. Although our financial condition is not good, my father arranged money by taking loans for my training and travel expenses to participate in the international competitions," she said.
