Year: 1964 | City: Amritsar
I was 15. Hair cut like the boys. Skirts and shorts were my uniform. A tennis racquet in one hand, schoolbooks and tennis balls in the basket, and a bicycle under me - my world was wide and open.
I rode across Amritsar with the sun in my eyes and wind in my face, often returning home near sunset.
Back then, that kind of freedom for a girl was unusual, even alarming. Whispers in our neighbourhood and even elders in the family repeatedly reached my parents.
"You are wasting money on daughters." But my parents weren't the confused type. They responded firmly, with clarity. "We are investing in self-reliant girls."
What if they hadn't? What if they had bowed to the social chatter that ranked a girl's ambition below the honour of a family name?
The story of Radhika Yadav is one of cultivation with potential to grow in abundance, but chopped as she got to bloom.
Her life began beautifully.
A father who believed in his daughter, introducing her to tennis, dreaming of an academy, of excellence, of independence. But when she began to fly - to shine, to create, to thrive - that same father faltered.
The chains of inherited patriarchy, the need to conform to societal norms, the fear of gossip - they all tightened their grip.
He forgot he had raised a champion.
This contradiction is still deeply rooted across regions and families in our country. We send our daughters to schools and universities. We help them build careers, sometimes even dreams. But the moment they outshine, the tide turns. Clan ego, family pride, male insecurity - they all conspire in silence. Often, girls surrender. Not out of weakness, but to maintain peace. To survive.
But this is also the era of a new kind of daughter. Today's Radhika - and many like her - refuse to give up. They don't want to just survive. They want to thrive. Because they believe in themselves. They know their worth, even when others forget it. But the truth is stark: daughters still remain tethered, not by their limitations, but by the mindsets of those around them.
Until society sees daughters not as threats or burdens but as powerhouses of possibility, India will remain shackled to a past it claims to have outgrown. Let's not just raise daughters. Let's stand by them when they soar and outshine.
Let girl power bloom.
(Kiran Bedi is former Lieutenant Governor, Puducherry. She is the first woman to have joined officer ranks of Indian Police Service. Recipient of Magsaysay Award (1994) for police and prison reforms, she has also worked as a UN police advisor. A tennis champion, she earned a PhD from IIT Delhi and is a Nehru Fellow. She's founded many NGOs and is the author of several books.)
Disclaimer: These are the personal opinions of the author
