Meerarani Hembram may soon have to pick between rugby and a livelihood.
The vagaries of amateur sport over the necessity of a steady income.
For the 21-year-old member of the Indian women's rugby team, it's an uncomfortable choice. But one that she's firming up for.
Little has changed since ESPN travelled to Meera's home in Bamnipal, about 135 km away from Odisha's capital city of Bhubaneswar, two years ago. Her home still doesn't have a toilet and the state government's promise of a job remains unfulfilled.
In February 2019, in the run-up to the parliamentary elections, the Odisha state government distributed cash awards to its rugby players pending since four years. It's these payoffs that help Meera make rent. No longer a student at the Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences (KISS), a free residential school for tribal children in Bhubaneswar where she'd been living since age 10, a job has now turned into a compelling need.
"If I manage to get a job but it doesn't offer enough leaves to train or travel for tournaments, I might have to quit the sport," says Meera. "Between sport and supporting my family, I might have to sacrifice my career. Jab tak khel paungi, tab tak khelungi (I'll play as long as it's feasible to)."
For the fly-half in the national side who was part of Odisha's women's rugby team's gold-medal finish at the 2015 National Games, the state government's job promise (police constable rank-job for a national medal) has long turned into a mirage. "We are turned away by the home department every time we approach them," says Meera. "Now, we are looking at other options of employment."
Seated beside her, teammate in the Odisha and national side Hupi Majhi, nods. She shares the predicament and the apprehension. A year younger, Hupi, who's now in final year of college at KISS, also coaches kids in rugby at the school. She'd attempted to branch into a supplementary career with a Level 1 referees training course and even officiated in one tournament -- the National School Games -- last year, but that avenue has dried up since. "There's no money in the role," Hupi says. "At smaller tournaments you aren't paid, so it's tough to sustain yourself if you don't have any other source of income."
It holds true for her lot.
Born into poor homes in the tribal belt of Kendujhar in Odisha, rugby happened to Meera and Hupi through KISS. Since they broke into the national side in 2016, they've turned its mainstays. While Hupi scored the highest number of tries at the Asian Rugby Sevens in Laos in 2017, Meera finished with the third-highest number of conversions. Indian women won five out of their six matches in that tournament and a silver.
But the challenge of pursuing sport as an amateur athlete without a job or a family to fall back on can be unsettling.
A professional league, which would open up the opportunity to be paid to play, might change that. The Indian Rugby Football Union (IRFU) has it pencilled in among its long-term plans. "It's something we're looking to create but we don't want to run it for a season and send it into cold storage like some other sporting leagues," says Nasser Hussain, IRFU general manager. "We have to ensure there's at least a three-to-five-year sustainability to start with."
The disparity in support between rugby and the more privileged sports is only obvious. "We look at KISS kids who're part of the Odisha junior cricket team and get paid for every match they play," says Hupi, who switched from cricket to rugby after being hit in the eye while wicketkeeping. "As players, sometimes you need that push to stay motivated. Maybe a professional league for us can make a difference."
But before a league can kick in, there's the tiny problem of visibility to sort. Currently, forget national matches, even international rugby is hard-pressed for takers in the Indian broadcast landscape. "We've to log on to World Rugby's social-media page for any international matches we might want to watch," Meera says. "Our families have never seen us compete at any international tournament. We were hoping last year's Asian Games would be a chance. Bahut saalon baad aisa mauka mila tha, woh bhi humse chhin gaya (We had got the opportunity after many years, but that too was taken away)."
"If I manage to get a job but it doesn't offer enough leaves to train or travel for tournaments, I might have to quit the sport. Between sport and supporting my family, I might have to sacrifice my career." Meerarani Hembram
The Sports Ministry scratched out the women's rugby team from the Asian Games-bound contingent after they were already lodged in Kolkata for a preparatory camp. In 2014 too, the team wasn't cleared for participation at the Incheon edition of the Games. Some team members, like captain Neha Pardeshi, had quit jobs to be able to train and travel for the Games last year and even ran a signature campaign as a last-ditch attempt at gathering support. Eventually, all of it came to naught. This when the players are already struggling with a lack of international exposure. The women's team participated in a grand total of two international tournaments last year -- Asian 15s in Singapore and Asian 7s in Brunei in June and October respectively.
On IRFU's immediate agenda though is to get rugby coaching into the National Institute of Sport's (NIS) programme either as a diploma or a six-week certificate course. Currently, despite being a recognized federation, rugby doesn't figure among the 26 sporting disciplines NIS offers a one-year diploma in sports coaching in, across its four centres in Patiala, Bengaluru, Kolkata and Thiruvananthapuram. IRFU is in talks with the Sports Authority of India and is in the process of drawing up a curriculum for the course. For the likes of Meera and Hupi, who fear their playing careers to run shorter than their peers, this would open up an avenue of taking up professional coaching and continuing to remain involved in the sport.
Last June when the team travelled to Singapore for their international debut in 15-a-side rugby, Meera couldn't help but wonder what path her life would have taken had her father changed his mind 17 years ago. Left in an orphanage when she was just three years old by her father, a daily wager struggling to feed five children, a Singaporean couple expressed their interest to adopt her. "My father turned down their request," she says. "Had he agreed, perhaps I wouldn't have had to worry about a job. But then, maybe I wouldn't be playing rugby."