Ayhika Mukherjee and Sutirtha Mukherjee, India’s top-ranked women’s doubles duo, made history by winning a bronze medal, the country’s first in the category, at the Asian Table Tennis Championships in Astana, Kazakhstan, on Sunday. Ayhika and Sutirtha became the first all-India women’s doubles pair from India to win a medal in the sport. According to Olympics.com, Gool Nasikwala won gold in the women’s doubles competition with Japan’s Yoshiko Tanaka in the tournament’s inaugural year in 1952.
The Mukherjees, ranked 15th in the world in women’s doubles, lost 3-0 to Japan’s world number 33 combo of Miwa Harimoto and Miyuu Kihara (4-11, 9-11, 9-11). The losing semifinalists receive bronze medals. In the second game, Ayhika and Sutirta held a four-point lead over their opponent. Miwa, a member of Japan’s silver medal-winning Paris Olympics 2024 team, and Miyuu, a three-time World Championship winner, mounted a stunning comeback to deny India any further chances of a comeback.
The Mukherjees created history last year in the Asian Games, winning India’s first medal in their division, a bronze. Last year, in Tunis, they became the first Indians to win a World Table Tennis (WTT) Contender women’s doubles title.
India finishes the Asian Table Tennis Championships with three medals, all bronze. The Indian women’s team opened the scoring with a historic bronze, the country’s first in the women’s team category since 1972, when the Asian Table Tennis Union (ATTU) began organizing the championship, following a loss to Japan. The Indian men’s team then repeated the feat, earning a bronze medal. Overall, the country has eight medals from the Asian Table Tennis Championships, all of them are bronze.