Indian wushu athlete Namrata Batra won a historic silver medal at the World Games 2025 in the women’s sanda 52kg event in Chengdu, People’s Republic of China, on Tuesday.
The 24-year-old, who won silver at the Asian Championships last year and is a four-time national champion, went down 2-0 to local favourite Mengyue Chen in the final.
It was India’s first-ever medal in wushu at the World Games and the country’s second podium finish at the ongoing edition after Rishabh Yadav’s bronze in men’s compound archery.
Namrata’s campaign began with a 2-0 win over Lebanon’s Barbara El Rassi in the quarter-finals, followed by another 2-0 victory over Krizan Faith Collado of the Philippines in the semis.
Wushu is a Chinese term, which translates to martial (wu) arts (shu). Wushu athletes compete for medals in two disciplines – sanda and taolu.
Sanda is a full-contact combat sport similar to kickboxing while taolu is a combination of gymnastics and martial arts where points are awarded for choreography and execution of routines.
India’s three wushu entries in Chengdu all competed in sanda events. Asian Games 2023 silver medallist Roshibina Devi Naorem (women’s 60kg sanda) and Abhishek Jamwal (men’s 56kg sanda) both bowed out in the quarter-finals.
India have now won a total of seven medals in World Games history – one gold, two silvers and four bronzes.
The five medals before Chengdu included Aditya Snehal Mehta’s snooker gold at Cali 2013 and Sumita Laha’s powerlifting silver at Karlsruhe 1989.
Indian badminton legend Prakash Padukone’s men’s singles bronze at the inaugural 1981 edition in Santa Clara, Abhishek Verma-Jyothi Surekha Vennam’s mixed team compound archery bronze in Birmingham in 2022 and Rekha Mal’s powerlifting bronze in 1989 are the three others.