Ranchi: On a hot summer afternoon in 2022, 11-year-old Anushka Kumari stopped near an open ground while returning from school. A group of boys from her village were running around with a football, erupting every time someone kicked the ball into the net. She had passed the uneven field, with stones scattered across its hard surface, and noticed the boys there many times before.
But that afternoon, she didn’t walk on.
“I just stood there watching them play with so much power, and how happy they looked. I told myself, ‘This is what I want’,” said Anushka. The next day, she made another stop at the field — not to watch the boys play, but to join them in a game. Soon, it became a habit, and she began arriving home late from school.
Three years later, Anushka, now 14, is a superstar not just in her Rukka Munda Toli, an Adivasi village on the outskirts of Ranchi, but across Jharkhand. Nationally, she is fast climbing the popularity ladder with an epithet that’s quickly becoming her second name — “The Goal Machine”. With 10 goals in just seven international matches, Anushka is widely seen as one of India’s key young strikers. Her latest achievement came in August in Bhutan, where she finished the 2025 SAFF U-17 Women’s Championship as the top scorer with eight goals, including a blistering 19-minute hat-trick in the final against the hosts, which India won 8-0 to lift the trophy for the third time in a row. On 26 December, she was awarded the Pradhan Mantri Rashtriya Bal Puraskar by President Droupadi Murmu.
“I gave everything to football. I fought against society and even my family just to play. Now, football is giving me recognition and happiness,” said Anushka, taking the spade from her elder brother and returning to mix the cement and water placed in a pit nearby.
The family of five is constructing its new home — a two-room house on a small piece of land next to where they currently live. The state government is providing raw materials — cement and bricks — under the Dr Ambedkar Awas Yojana, in recognition of Anushka’s achievements. Two labourers have also been assigned. But Anushka is on the job herself, helping her brother Ashish Munda (19) and mother Rita Devi (35). Her father is bedridden while her younger brother, 11-year-old Nikhil, is a Class 4 student slowly adjusting to the fame surrounding his sister.
Anushka’s home has become an attraction in the village. While her mother and brother work with the labourers on their new house on one side, relatives and neighbours gather on the other end to watch Anushka give interviews to the media, meet the panchayat president, and interact with district officials.
We thought she would come for one or two days and then stop on her own. But she never did.
— Sachin, village footballer
The girl who wouldn’t leave the field
Most kids around the world grow up idolising Lionel Messi or Cristiano Ronaldo. Anushka’s football heroes were the boys from her neighbourhood.
“We thought she would come for one or two days and then stop on her own. But she never did. And when she stopped coming, we saw her playing at the national level,” said 20-year-old Sachin, one of the boys Anushka used to play with on the ground.
They were impressed with her from the very first day, when the barefoot 11-year-old kept trying to kick the ball hard—just the way she had seen them do it—and even managed to score a goal.
“She’s the hero of this village and the nation now. Earlier, we watched her on the ground. Now we watch her on our screens,” said Sachin, showing Anushka’s reels on Instagram.
While her family had no idea about her after-school adventure, word soon got out that a girl from the village was playing football with boys, wearing shorts. When the news reached home, her mother went charging to the ground and dragged her back with a strict warning that she should never be seen playing football with boys again.
“Who will marry her if her leg or hand gets injured while playing—that was our biggest fear,” said her brother Ashish.
Villagers, too, had started talking — ‘what would people say?’ The taunts rose alongside the swelling crowd that turned up at the ground to take a look at the rebellious girl. But nothing else mattered to Anushka.
I was always ready for the beatings, warnings, and threats, and I never stopped going back to the field.
— Anushka Kumari
“I was always ready for the beatings, warnings, and threats, and I never stopped going back to the field,” she said, looking at her mother as she walked away carrying some bricks.
Making room for football
Inside Anushka’s old home, one room doubles as the kitchen, while the other is where the family lives. A corner shelf with four compartments is filled with clothes, with one section dedicated to Anushka’s achievements — medals, trophies, and certificates.
An iron box, once used to store new clothes and expensive items, is now filled with her jerseys, tracksuits, and football shoes, carefully stacked to protect them from dust.
“My mother, who once ran after me with a slipper in her hand to beat me, now carefully arranges my football shoes,” Anushka said with a laugh, recalling how her family once tried every possible way to stop her from playing football. Devi admitted she had only wished one thing for her daughter — that she would study and get a decent job.
“We never imagined that one day she would come home and fight with us to play football,” the mother said.
My mother, who once ran after me with a slipper in her hand to beat me, now carefully arranges my football shoes.
— Anushka Kumari
Anushka shuffled through her shoe rack next to the steel box, guiding her fingers through shoes in various colours — orange, green, blue, and black. A smile ran across her face as she remembered her early days of playing barefoot, or borrowing a pair from her seniors. Now, she lends her shoes to her teammates.
“My mother bought me my first orange shoes when I won the sub-junior national football championship. She used the money she had saved from working as a labourer,” Anushka said, adding that after the Bhutan championship, she has received several gifts, including shoes, jerseys, and an electric cycle from the district magistrate’s office.
And just like her family, the village too has eventually come around.
“Now parents want their daughters to be like Anushka,” said 16-year-old Reema Munda, washing utensils at a hand pump outside her house.
Now parents want their daughters to be like Anushka.
— Reema Munda, village resident
It wasn’t just neighbours, relatives, and Anushka’s family who noticed her stubborn refusal to give up football. Someone outside the village saw something else in it — courage and talent.
When Soni Kumari first met Anushka, she did not begin by trying to convince her parents. Instead, she asked the teenager to let her game do the talking.
“I told her not to fight at home, but to play and win,” said Soni, a coach at the Residential Girls Football Centre in Hazaribagh, around 80 km from Rukka. There were no practice grounds in her village, and no girl had ever played football with boys.
That year, Anushka participated in her school’s sports day and returned with medals in multiple races. Her school team also won the football match. The results made conversations at home easier. With Soni’s guidance, Anushka took her first formal step — securing admission to a football training centre.
At 12, she joined the centre in Hazaribagh. She lived in a hostel, attended school, and trained daily.
“After entering the centre, I never looked back,” Anushka said. “I played in the sub-junior national football championship for Jharkhand. Scouts were there. I performed well, and from there I was selected for the national camp.”
I told her not to fight at home, but to play and win.
— Soni Kumari, coach
Soni sensed early that Anushka could handle pressure.
“Her stubborn determination to make a name for herself in football, and her courage to fight family and social pressures set her apart and brought her recognition,” the 30-year-old said.
‘Want to be like Anushka’
After two years of training, Anushka found herself wearing India’s blue jersey at the South Asian Football Federation (SAFF) Under-16 Women’s Championship in Nepal in 2024. At 13, she emerged as the joint top scorer with five goals, scoring in every match.
“Playing for India is an athlete’s biggest dream,” she said. “Hundreds of players attend trials, and only a few get selected. Being part of the team and winning like this is the biggest dream come true.”
She began as an attacking midfielder, where her speed and close control stood out. As she moved through state and national age-group teams, coaches shifted her closer to goal. As a striker, Anushka became the focal point of the attack, pressing defenders, making runs behind the backline, and finishing chances with confidence.
“Even though she is the youngest and the shortest in the team, her power cannot be ignored,” said her coach, Soni. “The way she strikes the ball results in goals.”
Away from matches, attention follows her at the Hazaribagh centre. Juniors, and sometimes even seniors, approach her after training sessions. Some want to congratulate her, while others talk about game strategies.
“Many girls want to be like Anushka now,” said Suchita, one of her Under-17 teammates. “Even we want to do what she has done — make our parents and our country proud.”
While Anushka had to leave her village to train, others inspired by her and wishing to walk her path won’t have to. Soon, a training sports ground will be built in Rukka village.
“There are many Anushkas among us whose talent never comes out due to lack of infrastructure,” said Ujjwal Soren, zonal officer in Ormanjhi. “Anushka has inspired many girls and young athletes, and this training ground will help them on their path,” he added.
When asked about the footballers she admires, Anushka does not name a global star. She follows Layne Leisten, a player known for his achievements in US college soccer and youth clubs. Anushka likes watching him for his movement and leadership on the field.
“He is not very famous, but I love to watch him play,” she said. “One day he will be famous, and I will tell everyone I was following him from the beginning.”
For Anushka, the next goal is to join the senior national team. She already knows the jersey number she wants to wear when she gets there.
“My dream is to wear the blue jersey with number seven, score goals, and make India win on every field,” she said, referring to the famous jersey number worn by cricketer MS Dhoni and footballers Cristiano Ronaldo, David Beckham, and George Best.
Pointing to the new rooms coming up beside her old home, Anushka spoke of another plan already taking shape.
“One wall will have all my achievements and fame — the wall of my dreams,” she said. “All my medals and certificates will be there. I won’t have to explain where I started.”
(Edited by Prashant Dixit)