Saina Nehwal is an Indian professional badminton player widely regarded as one of the most successful athletes in the country's sporting history. She became the first Indian badminton player to win an Olympic medal when she claimed bronze at the 2012 London Olympics, and the first Indian to reach the world number one ranking in women's singles, a position she attained in April 2015. Her career has been instrumental in popularising badminton as a mainstream sport in India and inspiring a generation of women athletes.
| Full name | Saina Nehwal |
|---|---|
| Date of birth | 17 March 1990 |
| Place of birth | Hisar, Haryana, India |
| Sport | Badminton (women's singles) |
| Plays | Right-handed |
| Coaches (notable) | S. M. Arif, Pullela Gopichand, Vimal Kumar, U. Vimal Kumar |
| Career-high ranking | World No. 1 (2 April 2015) |
| Olympic medal | Bronze, London 2012 |
| Spouse | Parupalli Kashyap (m. 2018) |
| Major honours | Padma Shri (2010), Arjuna Award (2009), Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna (2009), Padma Bhushan (2016) |
Saina was born in Hisar, Haryana, into a family with a sporting background; her parents, Harvir Singh Nehwal and Usha Rani, were both former badminton players at the state level in Haryana. The family relocated to Hyderabad when her father, an agricultural scientist, was transferred to the Directorate of Oilseeds Research. She began training at the Lal Bahadur Stadium in Hyderabad under coach Nani Prasad before moving to S. M. Arif, a Dronacharya awardee, and later to the Pullela Gopichand Badminton Academy.
Saina won the Czech Junior Open in 2003 and went on to claim the under-19 national championship at a young age. In 2008, she won the BWF World Junior Championships in Pune, becoming the first Indian to win the title.
She announced herself on the senior international circuit by winning the Philippines Open in 2006, becoming the first Indian woman and the youngest Asian to win a four-star tournament. At the 2008 Beijing Olympics, she became the first Indian woman to reach the quarterfinals of the singles event.
Saina won the Indonesia Open in 2009, becoming the first Indian to win a BWF Super Series title. She followed this with three consecutive Super Series titles in 2010 — the Indian Open Grand Prix, the Singapore Open and the Indonesia Open. At the 2010 Commonwealth Games in Delhi, she won the women's singles gold medal in a memorable final against Wong Mew Choo of Malaysia.
At the London Olympics, Saina won the bronze medal after her semifinal opponent Wang Yihan defeated her, and the bronze playoff against Wang Xin ended when the Chinese player retired hurt. The medal was India's first Olympic podium in badminton.
After moving her training base to Bengaluru under Vimal Kumar in 2014, Saina enjoyed a strong run that included winning the China Open Super Series Premier in 2014 and reaching the final of the All England Open in 2015. On 2 April 2015, she became the first Indian woman to be ranked world number one in singles. She won silver at the 2015 BWF World Championships in Jakarta and bronze at the 2017 World Championships in Glasgow.
Saina won her second Commonwealth Games gold medal at Gold Coast 2018, defeating compatriot P. V. Sindhu in the final, and helped India to the team gold. She returned to the Pullela Gopichand academy in 2014–15 and again worked with various coaches in the late 2010s. Recurring knee injuries and surgery in 2017 affected her later seasons, though she continued to compete on the BWF World Tour.
Saina married fellow international badminton player Parupalli Kashyap on 14 December 2018 in Hyderabad. She is associated with the Bharatiya Janata Party, having joined the party in January 2020. A biographical film, Saina, directed by Amole Gupte and starring Parineeti Chopra, was released in March 2021.
Saina's emergence in the late 2000s coincided with India's wider transformation into a competitive badminton nation. Her Olympic bronze in 2012 broke a decades-long medal drought in the sport for India and was followed by P. V. Sindhu's silver at Rio 2016 and bronze at Tokyo 2020, building a sustained pipeline of Indian women in international badminton. She also raised the commercial profile of the sport in India, attracting significant sponsorship and prompting greater investment in academies and grassroots programmes.