For 17-year-old Iqra Fayaz, dreaming of becoming a football player in Kashmir has been full of challenges but she continues to fight with her family and society to become one.
A resident of Habba Kadal in the volatile Old Srinagar, Iqra says she started playing when she was 11 in the lanes and parks of her locality. It was only due to her attachment with the game that she continued to play despite opposition from her mother.
On Wednesday, Iqra returned from Haryana after taking part in a national football tournament. It has been years of struggle for her to convince her mother to allow her take part in national tournaments.
Iqra, , who recently passed her Class XII exams, says she brought her first football after collecting Rs 400 for two months from her pocket money. Today, she is training with the J&K State Football Academy.
“My mother was reluctant to let me play and I missed a number of national games despite being selected. One day, I expressed my problem with my coach and he told me to bring my mother to the stadium during the match,” says Iqra, adding that her mother would always say that football will not give her anything in life.
“When my mother came to see the match at a local stadium here, she was somehow motivated a little that I am not doing anything wrong. It changed her mind,” she says.
But for girls like Iqra, with little financial support at home, playing a sport is always a struggle. She says it was not an easy choice to make.
In Kashmir, girls are not encouraged by their families to pursue a career in sports. But many young women have broken this social barrier and carved their way in the sport of their choice.
I play football because I cannot live without it. It lives in me somehow, it is my love and my passion,” says Iqra.
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