Fueling Dreams, One Athlete At A Time: The Story Behind Saanjha

Any sport, beyond cricket, in India, is urging for investments. The investments can be in form of funds that help athlete to participate in international events. Or the investments can be in form of nutrition, equipment or helping athletes get a sports psychologist. Right nutrition, proper sports equipment and timely intervention of a sports psychologist can play a big role in nurturing an athlete’s career.

It is to solve these problems of Indian athletes that Vasundhra Magotra kick-started “Saanjha”. Saanjha is a crowdsourcing platform for grassroot sports talent from vulnerable backgrounds or territories. One of the biggest stories of this crowdsourcing platform is Arif Khan, a skier from Jammu and Kashmir. Arif was the only Indian athlete at the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics. Four years since the Beijing Winter Olympics, he will remain the only Indian athlete at the 2026 Milano Cortina Winter Olympics.

Arif will represent India in salmon (Alpine skiing) and he is only the third Indian athlete to represent India at two Winter Olympics after Jeremy Bujakowski (1964 and 1968) and Shiva Keshavan (six times from 1998 to 2018).

Arif, who is now supported by JSW sports, was initially backed by Saanjha in helping him realise his sporting ambition. By representing India internationally, Arif is changing how Kashmiris are perceived globally.

It is stories like these that make Vasundhra believe in the power of sports as a catalyst for social transformation. Saanjha has also supported Icestock player Aadil Manzoor Peer. The Sportz Planet has covered Aadil’s story in a detailed interview.

To know more about Saanjha and how it has been fueling the dreams of athletes, The Sportz Planet caught up Vasundhra for an interview. In the conversation she shared how she started the crowdfunding platform, how it works, the athletes it has helped and much more.

Excerpts of the interview are below:

What led to you starting Saanjha?

Vasundhra: I have always believed in the transformative power of sports, its ability to build discipline, resilience and identity. We started with Arif Khan. He was introduced to me by one of the friends and because I come from Jammu and Kashmir and he is a Kashmiri as well. That’s where a small journey started, we started a crowdfunding project within a crowdfunding site and we raised some funds but it wasn’t enough because sports in not a first priority for many.

So once Arif went to Olympics and thanks to a lot of people who came together for him, it was a community thing. I started believing that we can create a community which actually helps other athletes also. I was in Kashmir and I’ve got a few athletes around and that is when the idea of Saanjha started taking shape.

The word “Saanjha” is derived from Punjabi phrase Saanjha Chula. It is a Punjabi concept where a community comes together at one place to cook. I think if India starts coming together there’s a lot that can be done in sports instead of just talking about how our athletes are not achieving medals.

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Q: So how does Saanjha works?

Vasundhra: We have around 60 athletes at this point. These athletes need help in different capacities. It is not one size fits all. So if they have a requirement for equipment then we help raise funds for that.

We’ve identified four pillars. As we are growing, we are understanding how we need to refine ourselves and our approach and there are four pillars that we’ve identified. One is international competition.

Many athletes fail to participate in international competitions because they’re not supported by either the government or other organizations. They are not able to meet the financial requirements because their sport is not an Olympic sports. Generally government would not fund that sport. So we help raising funds in this case. The other one is sports nutrition.

A lot of athletes who come vulnerable backgrounds don’t have the right nutrition so if they ask for it we fund them for nutrition. There is equipment obviously which is most important. We have funded quite a few equipments for athletes and the fourth one is sports psychology.

I really believe that sports psychology is very important for athletes. Even more for kids who are coming from such backgrounds because they have various range of issues that we can talk about and that is something that we have been working on.

We are kind of creating a marketing portfolio for them (athletes) so that other corporates can start looking at those portfolios and perhaps start taking them for brand representations.

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Any success stories of Saanjha?

Vasundhra: There is Arif Khan, there is Adil, there is Jyotika Dutta (fencing) who went to Asian Games last year.

What makes Aarif so special?

Vasundhra: He (Aarif) qualified for 2022 (2022 Winter Olympics) also, you must be aware of that. He is 35 years old right now I think what makes him special is that his first Olympics happened when he was 31 years old.

The focus the grit and the resilience that that guy has it is amazing. He is very true to his craft and he just wanted to achieve certain goals and he has been at it since he was eight years old. There were times when he could not participate in international events because of lack of funds.

Since qualifying for the next year’s Winter Olympics, he has been constantly practicing either abroad or in India.

From your experience of working with the athletes, can you tell how can India improve in sports?

Vasundhra: What I can talk about is how sports can transform marginalized communities. I think this is where role models matter.

I think if we scale up we can impact and scaling up can come through funding and that would happen only when a lot of funders will start opening up to funding athletes not only because they are going to Olympics or some marquee event. I would compare it to education when you save a girl child or you educate a girl child. You don’t expect her to go to Harvard. I’m not expecting her to go to IIT. All I am just expecting her to do is to work.

I think sports should be like that! I think the top and the elite athletes are getting the funds, but the athletes who are a level or two below them, they are not getting money. I don’t know how to change but I would love to change that in some way or the other.

Saanjha says that sports can serve as a catalyst for social transformation. Can you elaborate?

Vasundhra: See we talked about it right when say a young girl from a remote village if she wins a medal it challenges the gender norms. If a boy from a conflict zone like a Kashmir represents India at international stage all of a sudden your perception shifts about Kashmiris change.

I think sports is a very very powerful language and it transcends across caste, class, religion and region. So I think the idea when you build role models, you’re not just building athletes, you’re building role models. Sports gives people visibility and voice also.

Prakhar Sachdeo
The Sportz Planet Desk