Athletic Female Camaraderie Struggles to Overcome Nationalistic Diktats as Indian Team Face Pakistani Squad

It is merely in recent years that female athletes in the South Asian region have been acknowledged as professional cricket players. Over many years, they faced ridicule, censure, ostracism – even the risk of violence – to follow their passion. Currently, India is hosting a World Cup with a total purse of $13.8 million, where the home nation's players could become national treasures if they secure their maiden championship win.

It would, then, be a travesty if this weekend's talk focused on their male counterparts. However, when India confront Pakistan on Sunday, parallels are inevitable. Not because the home side are strong favorites to win, but because they are not expected to exchange greetings with their rivals. Handshakegate, as it's been dubbed, will have a fourth instalment.

If you missed the initial incident, it occurred at the end of the men's group match between India and Pakistan at the continental championship last month when the India captain, Suryakumar Yadav, and his team hurried off the pitch to evade the customary friendly post-match ritual. A couple of same-y sequels occurred in the Super4 match and the championship game, climaxing in a protracted award ceremony where the title winners declined to accept the trophy from the Pakistan Cricket Board's head, Mohsin Naqvi. The situation might have seemed comic if it weren't so distressing.

Those following the female cricket World Cup might well have hoped for, and even imagined, a different approach on Sunday. Women's sport is supposed to provide a new blueprint for the industry and an alternative to toxic traditions. The sight of Harmanpreet Kaur's team members offering the fingers of friendship to Fatima Sana and her team would have sent a strong message in an ever more polarized world.

Such an act could have acknowledged the mutually adverse circumstances they have overcome and provided a symbolic reminder that political issues are fleeting compared with the bond of women's unity. Undoubtedly, it would have deserved a spot alongside the other good news story at this tournament: the displaced Afghanistan players welcomed as observers, being brought back into the game four years after the Taliban drove them from their homes.

Rather, we've encountered the hard limits of the sporting sisterhood. This comes as no surprise. India's men's players are huge stars in their country, idolized like deities, regarded like nobility. They enjoy all the privilege and influence that accompanies fame and money. If Yadav and his team are unable to defy the diktats of an strong-handed prime minister, what hope do the women have, whose elevated status is only recently attained?

Perhaps it's more astonishing that we're still talking about a simple greeting. The Asia Cup furore prompted much analysis of that specific sporting tradition, especially because it is considered the ultimate marker of fair play. But Yadav's snub was far less significant than what he stated immediately after the first game.

Skipper Yadav considered the winners' podium the "perfect occasion" to dedicate his team's victory to the armed forces who had participated in India's attacks on Pakistan in May, referred to as Operation Sindoor. "I hope they continue to motivate us all," Yadav informed the post-game reporter, "so we can provide them more reasons on the ground whenever we have the chance to bring them joy."

This reflects the current reality: a live interview by a sporting leader openly celebrating a armed attack in which many people died. Previously, Australian cricketer Usman Khawaja couldn't get a solitary peaceful symbol past the ICC, including the peace dove – a direct sign of harmony – on his bat. Yadav was eventually penalized 30% of his match fee for the comments. He wasn't the only one sanctioned. Pakistan's Haris Rauf, who imitated plane crashes and made "6-0" signals to the audience in the later game – also referencing the conflict – was given the identical penalty.

This is not a matter of not respecting your rivals – this is athletics appropriated as patriotic messaging. There's no use to be morally outraged by a missing greeting when that's merely a minor plot development in the narrative of two countries already employing cricket as a political lever and instrument of indirect conflict. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi clearly stated this with his social media post after the final ("Operation Sindoor on the games field. Outcome is the same – India wins!"). Naqvi, on his side, proclaims that athletics and governance must remain separate, while holding dual positions as a state official and head of the PCB, and directly mentioning the Indian leader about his country's "embarrassing losses" on the war front.

The takeaway from this episode is not about the sport, or India, or the Pakistani team, in separation. It's a warning that the concept of sports diplomacy is finished, at least for now. The same sport that was employed to build bridges between the nations 20 years ago is now being used to heighten hostilities between them by individuals who know exactly what they're doing, and massive followings who are eager participants.

Polarisation is infecting every aspect of public life and as the most prominent of the global soft powers, athletics is constantly susceptible: it's a form of entertainment that directly encourages you to choose a team. Plenty who consider India's gesture towards Pakistan belligerent will nonetheless support a Ukrainian tennis player's entitlement to refuse to greet a Russian competitor across the net.

Should anyone still believe that the athletic field is a protected environment that unites countries, go back and watch the Ryder Cup recap. The conduct of the Bethpage crowds was the "ideal reflection" of a golf-loving president who openly incites hatred against his adversaries. We observed not just the erosion of the usual sporting principles of fairness and shared courtesy, but the speed at which this might be accepted and nodded through when athletes – such as US captain Keegan Bradley – refuse to recognise and penalize it.

A handshake is meant to signify that, at the conclusion of any contest, no matter how bitter or bad-tempered, the competitors are setting aside their pretend enmity and acknowledging their common humanity. If the enmity isn't pretend – demanding that its players come out in vocal support of their national armed forces – then why are you bothering with the sporting field at all? It would be equivalent to put on the fatigues now.