The woman who brought the first Olympic medal to Indian badminton.
The woman who was the first to win the Asian Satellite Badminton Tournament twice.
The woman who was the first and the youngest Asian athlete to win a four-star tournament.
The woman is Saina Nehwal, the “darling daughter of India”—as hailed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself—and she is all of three and more.
Today she turned 27, and like most other people, she could’ve thrown a huge party and led a lavish day with attention surrounding all over her; instead, she chose to make it grand in her own benevolent fashion: she decided to donate Rs 6 lakhs to the families of the twelve martyred Central Police Reserve Police Force (CRPF) jawans killed in an attack in Chattisgarh last week.
“My heart goes out to our soldiers who put their lives at risk to keep us safe. I can’t bring those soldiers back who lost their lives in Chhattisgarh but in my small way I want to donate this six lakhs for those families,” the only female player from India to attain the world number one ranking told PTI on March 17.
Bollywood actor Akshay Kumar also donated Rs 1.08 crore to the families of the 12 CRPF soldiers killed in Sukma encounter when 219 battalion’s CRPF soldiers were ambushed by Naxalites in Bhejji when the troops were guarding a road being built between the village and Injeram on National Highway-30.
Meanwhile, Saina Nehwal celebrated her birthday at the Karnataka Badminton Association in Bengaluru with her mother and coach Vimal Kumar.
